Import/Export
How and why the American trend away from enclosed malls and toward town center-style mixed-use centers is beginning to take root overseas.
Simon Sykes

Author Simon Sykes is vice president with Baltimore-based Development Design Group Inc.

Until recently, America’s biggest conceptual contribution to the diverse arenas of global retail has been, without a doubt, the mall. In the mid-20th century, the American public, riding a wave of national optimism and a post-war economic boom, was ready to spend, and the mall phenomenon was happy to oblige. With suburbs and automobiles becoming an ever-more prominent feature of the physical and cultural landscape, malls represented the next logical step in the evolution of the consumer culture — the nation’s first true retail destinations. Prominent, stand-alone behemoths of pure commerce, these iconic edifices symbolized an enthusiastic, unabashed capitalism and embodied the best and the worst of Western-style consumerism. The antithesis of the dense, small-town mixed-use districts of Europe and pre-war America, shopping centers have more in common with their forerunners, the progenitors of all community commerce: the grand bazaars and souks of Asia and the Middle East.

Inevitably, malls went global. Today, from Armenia to Abu Dhabi, you are rarely more than a short drive away from a row of global retailers and a food court. In fact, the traditional shopping center concept has been adopted so successfully that, for many years now, most significant mall innovations have originated overseas. From radical entertainment concepts to interactive sports and dynamic media components, Europe, Africa and Asia have expanded the boundaries and helped redefine the possibilities of traditional centers.

Despite the apparent global success of the enclosed retail center formula, these traditional shopping centers have begun to wane in domestic popularity. In recent years, American enthusiasm for enclosed malls has been supplanted by a renewed interest in the kinds of vibrant mixed-use outdoor spaces that evolved naturally in cities and towns in the centuries before highways and mega marts. The move away from the enclosed mall formula and the increasing popularity of these town center-style mixed-use developments reveals a renewed appreciation for aesthetics, an increased recognition of the value of community and social gathering spaces, a craving for authenticity and convenience, and, ultimately, an awareness of the dynamic commercial possibilities of these developments. Once again, a trend that began in the United States is beginning to take hold overseas.

As with enclosed malls, the story of town center-style mixed-use centers involves charting the spread of an idea:exporting a successful American mall concept overseas. Fully understanding the origins and growing popularity of outdoor mixed-use centers requires a close examination of social and economic factors, cultural and historical context, and the reciprocal relationship between human behavior and the built environment.

Why?

Hampered by what Paco Underhill, consumer behavioral expert and author of Call of the Mall, calls a “lack of mercantile DNA,” a number of indoor malls have struggled to adapt to a changing world. Underhill explains that it is real estate, not retailing strategies, that drives the industry.

Many traditional shopping centers have stagnated and been slow to evolve, not because of a lack of motivation, but because they simply cannot. The very factors that make them so dramatically distinctive and identifiable — stand-alone locations, an exclusive focus on retail offerings, a formulaic look and feel — are also inherent structural and functional limitations that reveal a fundamental inflexibility.

Conversely, outdoor mixed-use environments and projects that revolve around a town center concept presents an organic layout that echoes recognizably familiar historical development patterns and promotes an adaptive framework of spaces, streets and storefronts. Unlike lifestyle centers, which are often referred to as “malls without a roof,” true mixed-use projects provide an integrated mix of retail, residential, dining and entertainment components, and rely heavily on urban design and planning principles. Vertically mixed, dense, sustainable, walkable environments, these mixed-use developments create a dramatic sense of place and a synergy of uses that fosters an energized whole that is often greater than the sum of its parts. These outdoor spaces are less about the architecture than about the power of the street, and about the ability of the street grid to simultaneously divide and connect; to harness human energy and attain the critical mass needed for retail success. While these developments are not as defined by large anchors, and are sometimes perceived as “unanchored spaces,” the public greens, lively squares and natural gathering spaces serve the same role and contribute the same defining identity as major anchor tenants.

The Greene in Dayton, Ohio, is an 800,000-square-foot shopping, dining and residential district designed around a central town square. Photo courtesy of Development Design Group.

The Greene, in Dayton, Ohio, is a classic example of the kind of mixed-use project that is transforming American development. An 800,000-square-foot shopping, dining and residential district designed around a central town square, The Greene features a progressive mix of Midwestern mercantile architectural styles. By making residential components a prominent feature in civic space, The Greene achieves a level of established authenticity; a mix of retail and residential that creates the dense livable space of a town that has evolved over time. Projecting designed elements into the public space with bridging components like canopies, colonnades and outdoor dining options enlivens The Greene’s streets and encourages residents and visitors to engage, experience and explore their environment.

Offering a mix of uses is the surest way to generate the density needed to drive revenue. Pictured is The Greene in Dayton, Ohio.  Photo courtesy of Development Design Group.

Although mixed-use projects like The Greene typically include attractive landscaping and abundant green space, natural gathering places like parks and piazzas, and an enticing blend of dining and entertainment options, it isn’t just atmospherics that makes them an increasingly popular development option. In a world where people are continually demanding more from their shopping experiences, offering a mix of uses is the surest way to generate the density needed to drive revenue. These designs work, ultimately, because they are profitable, not for reasons of nostalgia or sentiment. Adding dining, entertainment, office, and especially residential to a project can transform a 9-to-5 destination into a 24-hour-a-day dynamo. That variety of usage patterns fuels a cascade of self-sustaining and self-reinforcing retail activity. The bottom line is: without a sustainable retail diagram, there is no project. It is all about getting people to walk past storefronts, and mixed-use projects, with their animated sidewalks and ingrained circulation patterns, are proving to be the best way to drive that foot traffic.

The rise of factors like the Internet illustrates one of the inherent advantages that mixed-use projects have over their primarily retail-oriented mall counterparts: flexibility. The explosive growth of online shopping is still in its early stages, but it is indicative of the kinds of societal shifts that can make a purely retail endeavor more difficult to sustain. For a development to withstand changing trends and flourish despite economic ups and downs, there must be more to it. Because things may go out of style, but great places never do.

Going Global

Even in today’s increasingly global marketplace, many developing regions and countries still look to the United States to play its traditional role as the world’s free-enterprise innovator; test-driving engines of development. In Europe, where centuries of close-quarters human development have fostered the kind of dense, urban environments that house some of the world’s greatest and most memorable gathering spaces, mixed-use centers have been slow to catch on. The legendary piazzas of Rome and the historic streets of London, Paris and Barcelona are the historical inspiration for this style of development, and Europeans have thus far been understandably less inclined to attempt to “recreate antiquity.”

In Asia, Africa and the Middle East, however, dense mixed-use designs are beginning to gain some traction. In the past, malls have had to overcome faint echoes of colonialism and the stigma of possibly smothering unique cultural differences under the weight of their ponderous uniformity. With mixed-use projects, on the other hand, the street grid not only enables designers and developers to merchandize streets in a culturally sensitive way, it demands it. These projects thrive on a diversity of uses, and draw their energy largely from the vibrant patterns created by a mosaic of styles, uses and options.

Hopetown, a project currently under construction in Hangzhou, China, typifies the way new projects are incorporating open-air environments and connective elements into their designs. Hopetown’s compact site not only provides vehicular and pedestrian links to adjacent roadways, but also functions as a gateway, feeding into an attached residential community. Countries like India, China and Indonesia are leading the way in adopting cutting edge mixed-use strategies. Photo courtesy of Development Design Group.

Hopetown, a project currently under construction in Hangzhou, China, typifies the way these new projects are incorporating open-air environments and connective elements into their designs. A rich spacial environment, the Hopetown layout emphasizes the importance of courtyards, plazas, piazzas and pedestrian passages to help shape an experience that is simultaneously intimate and dynamic. Hopetown’s compact site not only provides vehicular and pedestrian links to adjacent roadways, but also functions as a gateway, feeding into an attached residential community with broad, tree-lined avenues and a large circular entry drive.

It is no coincidence that places such as India, China and Indonesia are leading the way in adopting cutting edge mixed-use strategies. Explosive population growth in these countries makes adding residential components to projects not only viable, but vital. Changing demographics also factor in, as booming economies add to an expanding pool of middle-class consumers.

Mixing it up

In a sense, the ongoing evolution from the mall to mixed-use centers represents a kind of “Developmental Darwinism,” where design concepts that draw crowds — and dollars — succeed, flourish and become examples to be emulated.

Fundamentally, outdoor mixed-use centers succeed because they facilitate, instead of dictate. Rather than impose a preconceived set of architectural and usage mandates on the physical and social landscape of a community, these places create a flexible, engaging infrastructure that allows the space to evolve naturally. These are projects that celebrate great streets instead of big buildings. They pay homage to the village; to the bustling squares of Europe; and to the town centers that were once at the heart of every American small town.

When designed with sensitivity and skill, mixed-use centers present intuitive layouts that blend seamlessly with the lifestyles and priorities of the people that live work and play in and around these developments. They make allowances for the kind of cyclical societal changes that reinvigorate and refresh, and they promote the evolution and growth of real places.

The biggest reason why this developing trend will continue to expand internationally and increase in popularity is because it is not so much a rigid formula as it is an adaptable philosophy — more temperament than template. The current vocabulary of these innovative spaces may be American vernacular but, ultimately, good ideas translate well in any language.

Simon Sykes is vice president with Baltimore-based Development Design Group Inc., an architecture, planning and design firm with a history of creating high profile, high-quality environments around the world.


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