During the crisis the business is experiencing hard times — this is understandable. Most often in unstable periods close individual stores or restaurants, but sometimes it happens that the integers are closed under shopping malls.
Tenants are moving out, business is stagnant, and the result is abandoned and nobody wants a Mall. We’ve gathered five of the most impressive shopping centers-ghosts and asked the experts in the field of retail, why they were overtaken by such a fate.
“The vast majority of examples of the dead shopping malls of America, and, of course, as any space where once was full of life, watching them is fascinating. The first malls in America appeared 60 years ago, and during that time they became almost 2000 across the country. Since 2006, the USA was founded less than a dozen of new large shopping centers (in Moscow, for example, over the past two years — more than a dozen), and “died” on the order of 500. The oldest malls for nearly 60 years, and they just can’t meet the new requirements. I always more interesting to talk about why closed shopping malls, and about what happened to them after. In the same America there are lots of great examples of reuse of former buildings of shopping centers — from Google office to residential apartments, as well as the many case studies on the transformation of shopping centers to hospitals, kindergartens, libraries, community centers, etc. It is interesting to observe and analyze the functions that returned life to these buildings, you might need to think about how to add these functions working in shopping malls now? “—says Ekaterina Asa, a graduate of the Institute for media, architecture and design “Strelka”, the curator of the educational module Disrupt the Mall.
“New world”, Bangkok
The Mall, which was deserted after the fire — it is said that the fire was arranged with the owner of a competing “New world” shopping Mall. Now the Mall and waterlogged… is teeming with fish.
“New world”, Bangkok
Photo: Chaiwat Subprasom / Reuters
Rolling Acres, Ohio, United States
One of the largest and most famous abandoned shopping centers. It was deserted because of the crisis, but it is also partly the fault of the developers — they continued to expand the trade area, not given the realities of a changing market.
Dixie Square Mall, Illinois, USA
Photo: Matt B / Flickr
Kloferleaf mall, VA, USA
This shopping center also, like the previous one, was built in the 70’s and expanded several times. The cause of his ruin, surprisingly, become aggressive teenagers — the Mall was located near a troubled area and often became a place for meetings and clashes of the local gangs that scare away visitors
Kloferleaf mall, VA, USA
Photo: Will Fisher / Flickr
Dixie Square Mall, Illinois, USA
This Mall is one of the oldest. It was built in the mid-60s, and in ‘ 78 he was abandoned. Later in the Mall were shooting the movie “the Blues Brothers”, but not even that brought him back to life, it remained empty.
Dixie Square Mall, Illinois, USA
Photo: Matt B / Flickr
New South China Mall, China
This new shopping center is the largest in the world. And he’s not quite abandoned — it opened a few shops at the entrance is less than one percent of the entire shopping area. The fact that the Mall is built based on the tourists, the flow of which while quite small, and the locals just can’t afford to visit it.
New South China Mall, China
Photo: Milowent / Wikimedia
And that in Russia? “2015 significantly changed the “map market” as in the commercial and office segments. In the commercial segment especially noticeable crisis “walked” on the new shopping malls — the norm was the opening with the half-empty gallery, and 1-2 “anchors”. Significantly “dipped” specialized retail facilities, including stores of goods for children (but the children save the last). As a result, retailers-tenants prefer to close unprofitable stores,” — says commercial Director of the company GLINCOM Ivan Tatarinov.
Shopping centers now are run with a high proportion of vacant premises, agrees Yevgeny Safonov, Advisor, research Department Cushman & Wakefield: “the Number of signed lease agreements are often much larger than the actual number of store openings. Completely non-functional aspect of shopping centers (when the project is opened and then closed) in the market, but there are projects with a high proportion of vacant space (50-60 percent), employing only the anchor tenants and entertainment area. However, it is rather isolated cases”.
“The Moscow market is already complexes, which are occupied by tenants is extremely difficult. For example, in the shopping center “Confetti” on Nagatinsky Vacant for more than 60 percent of the area, almost empty shopping center opened “Watercolor” on the Kirovograd street, a very high level of vacant space in the shopping center “Prague” in Rossoshanskiy proezd. In a difficult situation is and the shopping center “VDNKH VVTS about, there are anchor tenants, a food court and a checkout area and a significant part of the area given over to exhibitions and art galleries,” shares examples of the General Director of DNA Realty Anton White.
There are in Russia and these “ghosts” — for example, an unfinished Mall in the Moscow area Kozhuhovo or the victim of a fire shopping Mall “Airport” in Saint-Petersburg. A good example of what can be done with nedostroennyy shopping centre — recently opened, the Yeltsin center in Yekaterinburg, which turned an unused building into a cultural space.
In General, domestic shopping malls, in contrast to the us, only 10-15 years, until “natural death” them away. And the crisis, we will hope, still not forever.
