I feel like shopping malls and the whole shopping mall culture reached its peak in the 1980s, with arcades, the "mall rat" and "Valley Girl" thing, etc. They overbuilt malls in the '70s and '80s and so some have closed since then (see deadmalls.com), and they're not the vogue thing to build anymore, and since the advent of the internet and cheap home video games, they haven't been as important gathering spots. By the '80s, traditional downtowns were largely dead (this is before the '90s revival), and big box stores were certainly rising, but they hadn't become dominant yet, like they did in the early '90s. So malls were king in the '80s, the golden age of the suburban shopping mall.

I can still remember when the major shopping mall here was nothing but open land.  As soon as it was built in '84, every boy and his dog went there.  As of late, most of the stores that are downtown are relocating out to the mall (which is in the township).  Pretty soon, downtown shopping will cease to exist :o

I loved the malls in the 80's. It will never be like that again. From 1980-89. I was from five to fourteen years old. Some of my best memories are of the mall. The arcades, the great food, some cool stores, the pretty girls,etc. The mall had a much better atmosphere back then.

Malls have drastically changed. Smaller malls are almost the thing of the past, with larger and larger malls being built.

these days it's all about fakey "olde towns."

http://www.popmatters.com/features/tttp/3ward.shtml

these days it's all about fakey "olde towns."

http://www.popmatters.com/features/tttp/3ward.shtml


To quote a recent book/article on this very subject, it's "the geography of nowhere", which could also describe half of the Main streets in America. No matter where you go, there's a McDonald's, Wal-Mart and/or Best Buy.

As for the "fake olde towns", one of these is not far from where I live. If you haven't seen one, check out Easton Town Center in Columbus, Ohio:

http://eastontowncenter.com/

I guess if you can't have a "real" downtown, then you build a new one out in the 'burbs. That having been said, I have shopped there. There's no sense being a Luddite.

To quote a recent book/article on this very subject, it's "the geography of nowhere", which could also describe half of the Main streets in America. No matter where you go, there's a McDonald's, Wal-Mart and/or Best Buy.

As for the "fake olde towns", one of these is not far from where I live. If you haven't seen one, check out Easton Town Center in Columbus, Ohio:

http://eastontowncenter.com/

I guess if you can't have a "real" downtown, then you build a new one out in the 'burbs. That having been said, I have shopped there. There's no sense being a Luddite.
That transformation just overtook hunt valley, which is on deadmalls.com. I went there recently and it's been all redone, with little old-towney shops left and right and this piped in jazz music. It's rather spooky. It feels just like Bethesda, ballston, a million other places. The funny thing about these places is there's no community there, which is why the simulation of community needs to be so insistent.

I liked geography of nowhere, although that guy can get a bit strident sometimes. Jane Jacobs is awesome.

That transformation just overtook hunt valley, which is on deadmalls.com. I went there recently and it's been all redone, with little old-towney shops left and right and this piped in jazz music. It's rather spooky. It feels just like Bethesda, ballston, a million other places. The funny thing about these places is there's no community there, which is why the simulation of community needs to be so insistent.



How true. I can't help but wonder if some people mistakenly believe these places *are* the genuine item, but that's probably just the cynic in me speaking.  :)

This reminds me of something Billy Corgan said about nostalgia. The themed 50s/60s rock 'n' roll diners you see here and there aren't an accurate representation of an actual diner from the period. Maybe they're not meant to be, either. They're simply someone's "idea" of what diners might have looked like back then, even thought the architects likely never experienced the real thing. The Johnny Rockets diner mentioned in the Easton Town Center web site jogged my memory of this observation.

   

How true. I can't help but wonder if some people mistakenly believe these places *are* the genuine item, but that's probably just the cynic in me speaking.  :)

This reminds me of something Billy Corgan said about nostalgia. The themed 50s/60s rock 'n' roll diners you see here and there aren't an accurate representation of an actual diner from the period. Maybe they're not meant to be, either. They're simply someone's "idea" of what diners might have looked like back then, even thought the architects likely never experienced the real thing. The Johnny Rockets diner mentioned in the Easton Town Center web site jogged my memory of this observation.

   
Is geography of nowhere the one where kunstler gets into the Bauhaus? Those shopping malls of the 70s and 80s are very Bauhaus, forward-looking and futuristic (in that angular, non-ornamented way that indicated the future back in the 70s, like in sleeper and logans run) but they're also sorta like simulations of high schools -- built like high schools and with high school kids all hanging around in em all day. so that's their "community", that they imitate a public space but without any sense of responsibility or obligation to learn anything. Pauline kael sez movie theaters are similar; they're like classrooms (because everyone sits in a single room facing the same direction) but you don't have to learn anything. The trappings of community and purpose, in other words, placed into the service of consumption and leisure.

Anyway, the 70s and 80s malls being more futuristic, the olde town thing is more retro, backward-looking, trying to get at a small-town frontier mentality. I have a funny feeling it has something to do with the rise of political conservatism the last few years.

"Fast Times At Ridgemont High" defined the '80s mall as a remember '80s malls. 

A lot of these malls are now your "dead mall," which Kevin Smith defined in "Mallrats."  However, when I first moved here as a transfer to UMass in 1993, the "Mountain Farms Mall" built circa 1974 was universally referred to as "the dead mall."  There was a weird jewelry store, a Papa Gino's, an arcade, a sh!tty Chinese restaurant, a rancid AMC cinema, which we all went to 'coz it was cheap, and a few other crummy stores.  The big attraction, of course, was the weekend flea market, which grew like fungi on the carcass of the former Almy's dept. store.  Again, see Kevin Smith's "Mallrats."
Now "the dead mall" is gone and there's a plaza anchored by a Wal-Mart and a Whole Foods.  Of course, Wal-Mart now wants out of that location as they are fighting for one of their godawful "supercenters" up Route 9 a piece.
::)

fast times was a huge mall movie, yup.

funny, hunt valley is anchored by a wal-mart too. about the only thing unaffected by the whole deadmall-to-olde-townee conversion, that and the movie theater.

The way the malls look is the least of my problems... my biggest problem with the malls today is that I can't find anything I like in them anymore!  And back in the day, I saw things I wanted everywhere... but I couldn't afford them.  Go figure. ::)

Shopping malls were overbuilt through the '90s, now as a reaction to that mentality they build "old townes" left and right, but all the "old townes" are all the same. They build these developments left and right in the Northeast-condominiums, train station, Starbucks, "cutesy shops", yuppies, etc. They're trying to cover NJ with that and get rid of factories to do that, but so far they've been failing...thank God eminent domain isn't too popular here except with the NYC transplants. They failed in turning downtown Bloomfield, a funky multi-ethnic discount clothing shopping area, into a Starbucks condominium development. They said it was "blighted" because it was too "ethnic." And they built these massive condos in downtown Montclair by the new train station with names like the "Beaux Arts Mews", and it's right next to a place where you can here shootings every night. It's so classist and so, so stupid.

I think shopping malls are far superior to "power centers." They have social interaction and a sort of street culture unrivaled for the suburbs, I'd rather have shopping malls, which can be amazing, than endless sprawling big-box store developments in power centers and strip malls. Clifton Commons near me is sort of a compromise between an outdoor shopping center and a big box center. The anchors are all big box stores that share their buildings except for Barnes & Noble and Target, mixed in with some smaller chains and sidewalks. It's right next to a chemicals factory.

Malls still thrive in my area and pretty much peacefully coexist with strip malls and huge stores like Wal-Mart...the last mall built here in Atlantic County is Hamilton Mall which opened in 1987 and is humongous..and always draws the crowds. Why? Because there is a mix of stores that range from upscale(Macy's) to el cheapo(dollar stores), Sears, JC Penny, KB Toys, FYE, Claire's Boutique, Spencer Gifts....

The other mall here, Shore Mall, has been open since 1968...and got a huge 'shot in the arm', profitwise, by Boscov's, Value City, KB Toys, Burlington Coat Factory and TGI Friday's opening there in the 1980's...they also have a nice collectibles store called Beachcomber Collectibles, where I get most of my NASCAR collectibles and clothing.