ISBN10: 1635576024, ISBN13: 9781635576023, [publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA, New York] Hardcover Hardcover. Longlisted for the Porchlight Business Book Awards A smart and accessible cultural history. Los Angeles TimesA fantastic examination of what became the mall . . . envision[ing] a more meaningful public afterlife for our shopping centers.VultureA portraitby turns celebratory, skeptical, and surprisingly movingof one of Americas most iconic institutions, from an author who might be the most influential design critic writing now (LARB).Few places have been as nostalgized, or as maligned, as malls. Since their birth in the 1950s, they have loomed large as temples of commerce, the agora of the suburbs. In their prime, they proved a powerful draw for creative thinkers such as Joan Didion, Ray Bradbury, and George Romero, who understood the malls appeal as both critics and consumers. Yet today, amid the aftershocks of financial crises and a global pandemic, as well as the rise of online retail, the dystopian husk of an abandoned shopping center has become one of our eras defining images. Conventional wisdom holds that the mall is dead. But what was the mall, really? And have rumors of its demise been greatly exaggerated?In her acclaimed The Design of Childhood, Alexandra Lange uncovered the histories of toys, classrooms, and playgrounds. She now turns her sharp eye to another subject we only think we know. She chronicles postwar architects and merchants ...
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ISBN10: 1635576024, ISBN13: 9781635576023, [publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA, New York] Hardcover Hardcover. Longlisted for the Porchlight Business Book Awards A smart and accessible cultural history. Los Angeles TimesA fantastic examination of what became the mall . . . envision[ing] a more meaningful public afterlife for our shopping centers.VultureA portraitby turns celebratory, skeptical, and surprisingly movingof one of Americas most iconic institutions, from an author who might be the most influential design critic writing now (LARB).Few places have been as nostalgized, or as maligned, as malls. Since their birth in the 1950s, they have loomed large as temples of commerce, the agora of the suburbs. In their prime, they proved a powerful draw for creative thinkers such as Joan Didion, Ray Bradbury, and George Romero, who understood the malls appeal as both critics and consumers. Yet today, amid the aftershocks of financial crises and a global pandemic, as well as the rise of online retail, the dystopian husk of an abandoned shopping center has become one of our eras defining images. Conventional wisdom holds that the mall is dead. But what was the mall, really? And have rumors of its demise been greatly exaggerated?In her acclaimed The Design of Childhood, Alexandra Lange uncovered the histories of toys, classrooms, and playgrounds. She now turns her sharp eye to another subject we only think we know. She chronicles postwar architects and merchants ...
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Bloomsbury Publishing 2022 Hard cover New in new dust jacket.