Man, I just love this idea. Especially if they added a grocery store and really encouraged mixed use shops rather than all the normal mall stuff. I love the community it naturally fosters and I would do a lot for convenience. There’s something that feels so cozy about not needing to leave the building in inclement weather to grab a bite or run a couple errands, or just being able to take a nice lit, climate-controlled walk at night.
A few thoughts on this piece in particular: (1) The rent better be crazy affordable if they can’t have stove tops. Everything else seems great, but a kitchen you can’t really cook in makes it borderline uninhabitable imo. At least have one of those communal kitchens like they have in dorms.
(2) They mentioned natural light being an issue and that only exterior shops were typically suitable for retrofitting but the unit we see in the video appears to only have a window out into the mall. It’s hard to truly tell, but with the large skylight in the mall area, it seemed like the interior shop windows for the units received decent natural lighting.
(3) No explanation for the teeny tiny unit size? Maybe that was just the size of the preexisting space delineations, but I see no reason other projects couldn’t combine 2 to make normal sized studios or even one bedroom units.
Agreed on all fronts. I’d love to live in something like this as long as the mall had stores in it I liked. Like a true mixed use building.
She can’t have an open flame, ok. But she can’t have an electric range either?
I’m thinking the same thing. Came here to the comments to see if someone mentioned it. I don’t get why they can’t have an electric stove.
Cool idea but it’ll only work out for people who don’t cook and eat microwave or take out meals everyday.
You can buy an induction burner for like $50 and they work great and have no fire risk.
Why can’t they tear the malls down and replace it with affordable housing instead?
some mixed-use redevelopments do have some. if you want more, you need to convince your local governments zoning, permitting, and planning folks to demand more from these types of projects.
I do.
Cause rent-seeking
Why rebuild something when you can repurpose it ?
In many places around the world old structures like warehouses, train stations, churches, convents, fire houses and other things are seen as an architectural opportunity to repurpose as housing, usually due to cost, but that lead to very unique dwellings that end up influencing other houses that are built from the ground up. Architects pounce at opportunities like this. The results are often superior to what a standard house built from the ground up would be.
Good piece, and pretty cool.
Agreed. Hopefully this is done more in the future with other dying/dead malls. In my area they are converting old textile mills that have been long abandoned into apartments and the ones I’ve seen, look awesome.
We have something like that, Ponce City Market in Atlanta. I believe it was an old Ford plant. But, I think that they’re luxury apartments, which doesn’t really help fix the affordable housing issue.
