STANDING ON ITS OWN

Glendale, Ariz., is finally coming into its own. Long known as a suburb of Phoenix, Glendale hit the big time with sports fans in August 2006 when it opened the University of Phoenix Stadium, the host facility for the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl and upcoming Super Bowl. And "American Idol" devotees know Glendale as the home of 2007 winner Jordan Sparks.

But Glendale really began a concerted effort to change its image and break out from the shadows of Phoenix in the mid-1990s, according to Lorraine Pino, tourism manager for the Glendale Office of Tourism. And it all started in the historic downtown with antiques.

Antique dealers began buying and refurbishing the historic buildings in downtown's two districts -- the red-brick buildings of Old Towne and the early 20th-century bungalows of Catlin Court.

"Really, 15 years ago is when the revitalization began," Pino said. "The downtown had a couple of antique stores but mainly there weren't a lot of shops down here. And it was the core of the downtown businesses at that time that saw a vision to make this a true shopping destination and worked very closely with the city at that point to revitalize it. ... And now we're really on the map."

Glendale's renaissance to "Arizona's Antique Capital" was reinforced when USA Today and Sunset magazine proclaimed the town to be one of the country's top 10 best places for antique shopping. Now, however, the retail mix has expanded to include art galleries, hip boutiques and collectibles shops. And the city is offering an incentive program to attract nonchain restaurants to the downtown area.

Special events throughout the year bring even more people to the downtown area. While the Glendale Jazz & Blues Festival celebrated its 24th year in April, the other events debuted during the revitalization period have grown in popularity each year.

"Our signature events bring in more than 500,000 people a year," Pino said.

Glendale Glitters will celebrate its 11th anniversary this year and runs from Thanksgiving weekend through the first week of the year. During this time, Glendale comes to life with the addition of nearly 1 million multicolored holiday lights located throughout a 12-block area of downtown. This year's closing-day event, which included hot air balloons, live music and street performers, attracted about 100,000 people, according to Pino.

In February, the 12th annual Glendale Chocolate Affaire will be the same weekend as the Super Bowl, which should boost its attendance over this year's event -- a record 95,000 people. The upscale festival features chocolate and romance, gourmet cuisine and beverages, horse-drawn carriage rides, national entertainment and tours of Cerreta Candy Co., a family-owned business founded almost 40 years ago.

Glendale's newest downtown event is That Thursday Thing, an evening of fun themes, food, entertainment and extended shopping hours at the 90 antique and speciality shops. Started in 2005, the event is the third Thursday of the month from October to May.

"It's becoming a real destination for mothers and daughters, best friends, husbands and wives," said Pino, who sees a regular crowd coming back month to month and bringing their friends.

The best place to start the evening is at the Glendale Gaslight Inn, which hosts a half-price wine tasting during That Thursday Thing. The Gaslight Inn is one of downtown's recent success stories.

The red brick structure was built in 1925 and at different times housed a furniture store, a Masonic lodge, a dime store and a law office. It sat empty in 2004 when Teresa Seabrook first laid eyes on it.

"I was visiting with a girlfriend," said Seabrook, who hails from the Bay Area, "and I immediately fell in love with the building."

A retired teacher, Seabrook convinced her husband, who was still working in Silicon Valley, that they should buy it and turn it into a bed and breakfast inn. The deal closed in October 2004, and a year later Paul and Teresa Seabrook opened the Gaslight Inn.

"It fits so many of our lifestyle dreams," Teresa Seabrook said. "When we traveled personally, we stayed in B&Bs."

Living near Napa Valley, the couple had an interest in fine wine and desserts that led to the addition of a wine bar that features an eclectic list of affordable wines and a café that serves gourmet coffee, pastries, light fare and, of course, desserts. And Paul Seabrook's interest in jazz has turned the inn's large downstairs sitting area into a live music venue for area jazz artists on weekends.

And while downtown Glendale continues its revitalization efforts with a new parking structure and a pedestrian improvement project that includes brick pavers, public art and additional landscaping, it's the ongoing development four miles west of the city center that is garnering much of the attention.

That's the site of Glendale's sports and entertainment district, which has risen from the cotton fields off Loop 101 only in the past five years.

The University of Phoenix Stadium, home of the NFL's Arizona Cardinals, opened last year and has been lauded for its design. Shaped to look like a barrel cactus, the domed stadium sprawls over 25 acres, contains 1.7 million square feet and seats more than 63,000 during the regular football season and 74,000 for bigger events.

Not only is the roof retractable, but so is the field.

The only natural grass playing field in the country that is fully retractable, it moves on an 18.9-million-pound tray. Without its field in place, the multipurpose facility has the ability to host basketball games, concerts, consumer shows, motor sports, rodeos and corporate events.

The arena's inaugural Fiesta Bowl and BCS National Championship games were successes in every way -- providing exciting action and sell-out crowds -- but the University of Phoenix Stadium has become a tourist attraction in its own right. Guided tours are a popular way for sports fans to get a behind-the-scenes look at what Business Week magazine described as "one of the 10 most impressive sports facilities on the globe."

"Demand is extremely high for tours because we're the newest and most advanced stadium around," said David Cox, marketing coordinator for the stadium.

The facility's construction was preceded by that of its next door neighbor, the Jobing.com Arena, which opened in 2003 and is home to the NHL Phoenix Coyotes team. Jobing.com Arena serves as the anchor to the Westgate City Center, a mixed-use development which, upon completion, will include more than 6.5 million square feet of retail outlets, entertainment, restaurants, offices, residential condominiums and hotels.

Phase I, the initial 510,000-square-foot development, opened to the public in November 2006 in limited fashion with only a few restaurants and a sports merchandise store; other retailers, restaurants and a 20-screen theater opened in the following weeks. Phase I also includes an upmarket 12-story, 320-room Renaissance Hotel, scheduled for completion this month.

The hotel is one of several under construction and slated to open before the Feb. 3 Super Bowl.

"We saw that during the Fiesta Bowl and BCS, people were staying as far away as Tucson because rooms get filled up. But more hotels are being built all the time. In fact, by Super Bowl time, our rooms will nearly triple in the city of Glendale," said Pino, adding that the city currently has approximately 500 rooms.

"That whole development out there (Westgate) with its millions of square feet of retail and the hotels that are coming will truly make us no longer a daytime destination, but an overnight destination, which we haven't been before because we didn't have the rooms," she said.

Glendale's transformation from a sleepy suburb into the state's sports mecca continues. A new baseball complex will be built two miles south of Westgate City Center to serve as the spring training center for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Chicago White Sox. The facility is expected to open in 2009.