On a recent research trip to China, I wandered through the Oasis Mall in suburban Shanghai. Like many Chinese shopping centers, this complex was filled with empty stores that reflected the end of China’s 30-year-long economic expansion. But there also were surprises.
Along a stretch of the mall’s interior walkway, a cluster of parents and grandparents sat on chairs. They were looking through a plate glass window, watching a dozen 5- to 7-year-old girls practice ballet steps, carefully following their teacher’s choreography. A space initially designed for retail had been turned into a dance studio.
From 1990 through 2020, large, shiny shopping malls embodied China’s spectacular economic growth. They sprouted in cities large and small to meet consumer demand from an emerging middle class that was keen to express its newfound affluence. These centers look familiar to American eyes, which isn’t surprising: U.S. architectural firms built 170 malls in China during this period.
On a recent research trip to China, I wandered through the Oasis Mall in suburban Shanghai. Like many Chinese shopping centers, this complex was filled with empty stores that reflected the end of China’s 30-year-long economic expansion. But there also were surprises.
Along a stretch of the mall’s interior walkway, a cluster of parents and grandparents sat on chairs. They were looking through a plate glass window, watching a dozen 5- to 7-year-old girls practice ballet steps, carefully following their teacher’s choreography. A space initially designed for retail had been turned into a dance studio.
From 1990 through 2020, large, shiny shopping malls embodied China’s spectacular economic growth. They sprouted in cities large and small to meet consumer demand from an emerging middle class that was keen to express its newfound affluence. These centers look familiar to American eyes, which isn’t surprising: U.S. architectural firms built 170 malls in China during this period.
The Oasis (blue building) is one of some 6,700 shopping malls in Chinese cities. Hundreds of new centers open yearly.John Rennie Short, CC BY-ND
Like their U.S. counterparts, many Chinese malls have fallen on hard times. The COVID-19 pandemic and the rise of online shopping have devastated foot traffic, leaving the nation with a huge overhang of retail space. But many Chinese malls are being re-imagined by owners and users as palaces of experience – civic areas for communities to meet and interact, with new configurations of public and private space.
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