Photos of "Malls Across America," 1989

In 1989, Michael Galinsky toured the malls of the US with a cheap camera in-hand. Years later, he's launched a Kickstarter project to compile those images into a photo book celebrating these dying bastions of American culture. As my pal Koshi who sent me the link said "I can smell the Hickory Farms and corn dogs." From Kickstarter:

I shot about 30 rolls of slide film in malls from Long Island to North Dakota to Seattle. It was hard to tell from the images where they were taken, and that was kind of the point. I was interested in the creeping loss of regional differences. I thought a lot about (photographer Robert) Frank's "The Americans" as we drove from place to place without any sense of place.

"Malls Across America"

David Pescovitz is Boing Boing's co-editor/managing partner. He's also a research director at Institute for the Future. On Instagram, he's @pesco.

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Trevour

The Sears storefront at the mall in Fargo still looks like that, except it glows blue. The rest of the mall has been modernized over the years, but that sign just stays the same. Now that I think about it, the Payless next to it has its old signage too.
adamnvillani

Anybody doubting the existence of dead malls should check out http://www.deadmalls.com/

Just thinking about the area where I grew up, Long Beach, California, Long Beach Plaza opened to great fanfare in 1981 anchored by J.C. Penney, Montgomery Ward, and Buffum’s department stores (only one of which still has existed as a company for more than a decade). It enjoyed a brief heyday but lost money pretty much from the start; by the 1990s it was half-empty, and the stores it did have were marginal setups like dollar stores, school uniforms, beepers, etc. The mall was closed in 1998 and demolished soon after, and an outdoor shopping center anchored by a Wal-Mart replaced it.

Marina Pacifica mall, on the other side of town, was also closed and transformed into a different shopping center (anchored at first by a Tower Records and Good Guys, both of which closed years ago and replaced with a Walgreens).

Within a half hour’s drive, I can think of a lot of other malls that existed in the 1980s — about half are still in operation today as enclosed traditional malls, and the other half have all closed and been rebuilt as something else — Carson Mall, Huntington Beach Mall, Buena Park Mall, etc.
- Anonymous
  
  I grew up in Carson and frequented the Del Amo mall and the new Carson Mall that had been built in the mid 70′s, anchored by Sears and JC Penney. The Hawthorne Mall is the only one that I know of that ‘died’ somewhat in that part of the South Bay. I was traveling all across America myself during the late 1980′s and a mall would be the only way to get the clothing brands I preferred. But it was amazing that they all WERE so much alike and perhaps that’s the thing that made everything more trustworthy. You knew you would likely find what you wanted, or had a warm place to congregate and do all you needed to for a few hours. I had a nostalgic trip back to the Del Amo mall, by working for the Tarantino film, “Jackie Brown” shot back in 1999. I’d say the evolution of malls has now become an indoor/outdoor extension, especially in California. The Americana malls now feature upscale stores, spectacular outdoor holiday decor and entertainers, a trolley car and adjacent condo/apartment housing at some locations. One wonders at who has the money to spend at this level of attraction, and if these places will thrive in this economy. But malls ARE everywhere, and nearly as iconic as the very stores that occupy them.
Quiet Wyatt

My god… The hair… the… hair…
knoxblox

I don’t often frequent the mall these days.

I had my fill of shopping mall ambiance when working at a multiplex theater in my teens…along with my fill of garbage-bag popcorn and a silly vest-and-bow-tie work uniform.

However, if there was even the slightest opportunity of killing otherworldly monsters with a katana or a light-saber I found wedged in the doorknob of a rear entrance, I might consider going back.
Keith

Looking back at it, the late 80s, early 90s really was the heyday of Mall culture. For whatever that’s worth.
bcsizemo

My god, did Aquanet come in gallon containers…

I’m sort of glad I was a kid in the 80′s, to young to live it all up, but aware enough to remember the good times.
Anonymous

Wow, I recognized the Smith Haven mall immediately just by the floor tiling. Too bad you didn’t get any shots of the giant neon shapes hanging from the ceiling, they were very 80′s.
irksome

Okay, I have a confession to make. In 1983, I was living in Boston and couldn’t afford a good haircut so I cut it myself. Since I couldn’t see the back, I let it alone. Then one fateful day, we took a ride up to Kelly’s Roast Beef on Revere Beach…

So the mullet? Sorry, my bad.
- spriggan
  
  ALL. YOUR. FAULT.
  
  ~ Greetings from Watertown.
jimbuck

I think that’s the smithhaven mall on long island in the first shot. I worked at that sears one summer. But then again, it could be just about any mall in the country.
Anonymous

jimbuck
that is the smithhaven mall- i started the project there
michael
Robert

Can anyone comment as to the veracity of the statement that malls are dying? I admit, I’ve never gone to malls very often, doing most of my shopping online, but then I feel I’m an outlier. When I do go to my local malls, they seem as alive as ever, compared to my experiences in the 80′s.
- Keith
  
  Basically, in the 90s, too many malls to be sustainable were built all over the country (I know, that seems so unlike Americans, right?) and now with online shopping and the Don’t-call-it-a-Depression, what’s happening is that some of the malls that were struggling to begin with are emptying out. You have 3 malls in an area and 1 becomes dominant for whatever reason (Cheesecake Factory!) the other 2 start to wither. So it’s not that all malls are going away, just that our mall surplus is slowly drying up.
- Jonathan Badger
  
  Well, the problem with malls is that they are generally anchored by department stores, and *those* are dying. Once those go, the rest of the mall tends to die. These days people tend not to shop at places like Sears — I went to the Sears at the local mall last weekend and I practically was the only customer.
  
  These days people shop at Best Buy, Target, Wall-mart, etc, and these tend to have their own buildings.
  - flosofl
    
    The one area you still see a good number of people is in the appliance sections at Sears (I saw almost no one in any other area).
    
    For big ticket items (washer/dryer, fridge, etc…) I want to actually touch and see the thing before I buy it. I just had a front load HE washer and dryer combo delivered, stacked and hooked up over the weekend from Sears. I got the Kenmore based on Consumer Reports. Yes, it was available to purchase and set up delivery/installation online, but when I’m spending enough to buy a small used car I want to physically see the thing and kick the tires so to speak.
    
    I’m not sure if the brick and mortar Sears are going anywhere anytime soon. They may simplify their offerings to appliances and automotive stuff.
scifijazznik

I graduated high school in ’89. I hated the malls then, I hate the malls now. Other than the indoor smoking and the hair metal kids being replaced by hipster/emo kids, it looks pretty much exactly the same.
NoctilucentStudios

You know what they say, if you’ve seen one building with all the stores in it, you’ve seen them all.
ian_b

Maybe they all look the same, but one shot from that “dying malls” gallery reminded me a lot of left 4 dead 2′s mall:
The mall:
http://www.themorningnews.org/archives/galleries/ghosts_of_shopping_past/03gosp.php
The best screenshot I could find:
http://guidesmedia.ign.com/guides/14352241/images/images/l4d2_0453.jpg
snakedart

“Celebrating?” Yeesh … let them die already.
johnocomedy

watching that made me crave an Orange Julius
Anonymous

I don’t know where y’all live, but here in the PNW the malls are doing just fine. Even the crappy strip malls are mostly surviving, unless they’re in really bad neighborhoods. Seriously, where do you people live that malls are dying off and if they are, what are they being usurped by? Walmart? Not up here.

Americans love convenience and the illusion of a bargain and teenagers love to congregate in large groups and ogle each other. Until these two fundamental aspect of American culture change, malls are going to be around for quite some time.
- Jonathan Badger
  
  I think part of the issue is the definition of “mall”; when people say “malls are dying” they are referring to *enclosed* malls. Yes, part of this is due to overbuilding in the 1990s, but there is a real shift away from this style in new development — those “crappy strip malls” that you mention are in part what is replacing malls; at least they are what new development consists of — and this isn’t just anecdotal — the Economist had an article last year which had something to the effect that no new enclosed mall had been built in the US for something like five years previously. Strip malls, or their upscale cousin, the “lifestyle center”, is what is replacing them. Well, that and online shopping.
  - Anonymous
    
    Thanks, I didn’t know there were differences and classes of malls until you mentioned it. I now stand more enlightened. I guess the “big malls” I’ve said are considered enclosed super regional mall.
    
    Online shopping can only do so much. It works if shipping is free or the cost low enough.
MrsBug

I flashed back so hard I think I twisted my neck. The striped shirts, big hair, acid washed jeans….yeah, I remember that.
JimM

Is it rude for me to be cynical as to how lazy this project seems? Bring a cheap camera to malls and take crappy pictures, then sell the book for money. Then again, maybe its very laziness somehow correlates to the feeling we get when we go to malls.
Anonymous

I just bought a new fridge at Sears. Department stores are dying? Really? And Target’s not considered a department anchor? I didn’t know that.

Where I am, most of the smaller local malls,think 1-2 department store + 1-2 grocery store, died off. They’ve been replaced by big malls with all if not most of the department anchors.

I do agree though, if you’re not living in a more urban dense area, your mall is mostly a large concrete parking lot of large independent stores like Best Buy, McDonalds, etc,. You don’t just walk to them, you HAVE to drive across the parking lot to get to one store from another, because the stores and the parking area is that big.

I prefer malls in that sense.
tallcedars

I remember having dinner at a mall in Durham, NC with friends around the time these photos were taken. Their kid took a ride on the carousel in the center court after dinner. The next day I was in Austin, TX. There was a mall next to the hotel and I ended up stopping in for something. Same carousel. Two days later I was in Santa Fe, NM. I’d forgotten sunglasses (a real requirement there in the summer), so I stopped in at the mall. They all have a Sunglass Hut, right? It was next to… the carousel. Very surreal trip.

I now live in the PNW, by the way, hours from the nearest mall. That means that there are real downtowns here. They’re a great improvement.
kmoser

Why not just build a photo book online (using, say, Snapfish) and let anybody order it? If you wanted to control production you could place the orders on behalf of customers.
- Anonymous
  
  i would rather get them printed offset with a great printer.
Rachel H

When I first watched it, the sound wasn’t working for whatever reason. Without the music, the pictures were haunting somehow.
Anonymous

Anyone know what the song is? Thanks.
penguinchris

I was 3 in 1989, but my vague memories of going to the mall as a kid aren’t much different from these photos. After the early 90′s malls took two different paths – they either stayed as they were, becoming more and more drab and depressing, or they went up-scale.

I really dislike malls, actually, they invoke a feeling of teenage consumeristic disgust, what with all the overpriced, crappy food court food, and all the shitty overpriced merchandise marketed to teenagers. It makes me feel like a high school loser. That’s besides the fact that most malls are dark and drab.

However, I *do* like upscale malls. A great example in the US is South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA. There are also some fantastic ones in Bangkok. I enjoy browsing all of the actually nice merchandise (it’s still overpriced, but at least it’s nice). I don’t buy much – if anything – if I go to an upscale mall because I have no money, but it satisfies that inner drive to go shopping most people have (evolved from hunting & gathering I suppose).

Maybe I’m just a snob, I don’t know :)