[Urbanstudy] Second posting. Student Stipendship. Architectonics of the Mall.

[ipsita sahu]

Hello All,

In this posting I am going to analyze the architectural design of the
Mall in terms of its social,  and psychological impact on consumers.
Key words and concepts
that I will be dealing with are commodity fetishism, advertising,
electrical stimulation, hyper stimulus, and distraction. An important
aspect of my account is about the way in which the mall functions as a
'strategic' space and my two pronged approach looks into both the
conception and structuring of the mall space by the
producers/architects/developers in a way to maximize profit and its
reception by consumers as a place of distraction and nervous
stimulation and an urban labyrinth where the consumer can 'lose'
oneself both spatially as well as psychologically.

The façade or outer front display of the mall building is a crucial
architectural feature as it functions as an effective 'media of mass
communication', for attracting consumers from the surrounding region
towards the mall premise. Although apprehended in an offhand and
passive manner, these surfaces are rendered more effective precisely
due to their inert reception, to maneuver the movement of crowd
towards the mall, by using their hidden persuasive powers of
aesheticisation. The sheer monumentality of the mall buildings
together with the eye-catching façades makes them conspicuous in the
daytime and as night follows the illumination emitted from these
structures through the electric advertisements, spilling out interior
lighting and brightly lit outwardly visible window displays, attracts
consumers like light magnetizes gnats, and imbues the structure with
an effulgence which enhances its distinctiveness as a 'fantasy' space.

Amongst the Ghaziabad malls, EDM, Ansal Plaza and Pacific mall are
prototypic examples of such post-modernist 'functionalist facades',
constructed with glass and steel material, and embellished with
electric advertising boards. (I borrow the term 'functionalist façade'
from its usage by Janet Ward in her book titled 'Weimer Surfaces' to
describe building facades of Weimer Germany during the 1920s.The term
'functionalist' was used to emphasize upon the strategic aspect of
facade decorations to serve as surfaces for advertising. The
appropriateness of using this term for the Ghaziabad mall lies in its
articulation of the façade as purposeful -in terms of its use for
advertising and not merely decorative.).  In contrast to these malls,
the façade of Shipra Mall is archaic in style, although grand and
ostentatious. This impressive building which spreads over
an area of 4.5 lakh sq ft. is built on the lines of Classical
Romanesque architecture and is claimed to be the largest and widest
mall of Ghaziabad. A porch heralds the gateway to the mall where cars
pause for the passengers to get off   and be welcomed in a rather
dramatic fashion by uniformed valets and one or two other mall
officials dressed in formal suits.

As one enters the interior space of this mall, the architectural décor
appears in sharp contrast to the exterior, for the interior is
furnished in modern style using the combination of glass, steel and
light for its primary aestheticisation. The interior design is
reminiscent of a galleria with retail shops of three floors
surrounding a vast elongated empty space in the center, like in the
Pacific and East Delhi Mall. The roof of the building is made of
transparent glass, a unique feature of the mall as it gives the
consumer an idea of the time, in outright retaliation of a general
principle of malls to efface time and duration. Jon Goss in his essay
'Magic of the mall' also interestingly points out a matter of great
surprise, that one hardly ever sees a clock in the malls, something
that appears even more curious by the fact that consumers spend so
much time inside malls.

The Shipra Mall  provides for 'in-house vegetation', which may perhaps
be seen as an attempt to perhaps bring some vestiges of the outside
landscape into the interior as also to create an artificial
'naturalness' in these built spaces. Also in combination with the
glass roof, allowing penetration of natural light, the interspersing
of Palm trees and shrubs within these interior spaces, creates an
illusion of  'open space' and 'pseudo- streetscape'.

Scholars have variously described the mall's spatial/experiential
character as 'hyperreal' or liminally as 'virtual reality' referring
perhaps to the hypersensuality and phantasmagoria of these spaces. As
pointed out by Jon Goss in his essay, 'The Magic of the Mall', malls
are as such abstract 'nowhere-spaces', consumption utopias, idealized
 and hence estranged from reality. Jon Goss's description may be
compared to Foucaults 'hetrotopias', or the 'deviant' 'virtually real'
spaces, which function in transit as it were between real space and
utopia. The mall's 'hetrotopic' nature is most strongly exemplified in
its reference to global and universal spaces and experiences of
consumer capitalism, and its apparent severance from the immediate
local environment. As stated by Malcolm Voyce in his essay, 'Shopping
Malls in India', these spaces 'do not reflect the local history but
instead inculcate the tastes and identities of global consumer
culture.' Also these spaces are amalgamation of past and existing real
formats, such as the airport, hotel resort, amusement park and street
shopping center of the downtown. The mall in this sense appears 'odd'
and 'confused' and this nature is hightened by the fact it also
operates a variety of activities- entertainment, shopping,
recreational activities, eating etc. all at one place. Also once a
person enters these spaces, he could be just anywhere in the world as
they all look the same. In all these ways the Mall resembles a
'hetropia'.

There is an element of 'excess' and 'hyper' attached to the mall's
sanctum, as for eg, the spotlessly clean and shiny surfaces, the
excessively sanitized condition, perfectly clean and fresh atmosphere,
rightly regulated temperature, brightly lit showrooms, beautiful
mannequins and elaborate window displays, music to lift up one's
spirits, all add up to create a hypersensorium of visual and aural
stimuli.  (It is not an accidental feature that one sees from time to
time employees cleaning different parts of the mall floors, for these
activities are strategically performed in order to bring to the notice
and thus assure the consumer of the perfect sanitary conditions in the
mall. Research in the Pacific and Shipra mall has revealed that the
malls on an average employ eighty to hundred cleaning employees to
look after sanitation within the mall premises. These workers, around
twenty five at each sitting, periodically clean assigned portions of
the mall in shifts of eight hours, after which the work is carried
over by the next set of workers. The toilets, and each mall usually
maintains two sets of washrooms- one on either ends of each floor, are
routinely cleaned by staffs who wait in turns on each of the users and
check and restore hygiene in the washrooms after every use. Moreover,
as revealed by one of the staff member of the Shipra Mall, in the
residual spaces of the mall i.e. excluding the retail showrooms, the
exposed walls are painted every alternate week to keep the mall
interior looking new and scrupulously clean all the time.).

The mall may be seen as a highly technologised space by its use of air
conditioners, programmed music, lighting, computerized camera
surveillance, flat T.V screens hanging in food courts and other places
for casual watching and electric advertising. The flood of visual and
aural stimuli emanating from these sources creates physical and
perceptual shock for the consumer which produces the famously
theorized neurological state-the 'distracted' mind. (See Anthony
Vilder's 'Walter Benjamin and the Space of Distraction' in his book
Warped Space. Also see 'Modernity, Hyperstimulus, and the Rise of
Popular Sensationalism' by Ben Singer.) Here I use the term in the
sense in which Kraucer refers to it, i.e. as a subconscious state of
mind which is so saturated with rapidly moving fleeting images that it
temporarily i.e. for as long as the state lasts, suspends any
conscious thought, passively receiving impressions as though in a
state of shock. This state of distraction is different and
antithetical to Walter Benjamin's use of the term to connote
dispersion and scattering resulting in disinterest and
absentmindedness' or what is better known as the blasé attitude of the
urban dweller. On the other hand the distraction experienced within
the mall environment is addictive and it is lack of 'entertainment' or
'distraction' that causes jadedness and boredom. The hyperstimulating
environment soothes the overexcited nerves of the consumer and
provides sensory relaxation. One need not strain ones mind anymore
with thoughts, but simply allow seeing, hearing and feeling without
thinking.

Of all the sources of stimulus, electric advertising causes the most
sensational impact on the consumer. Janet Ward in her book 'Weimer
Surfaces' defines advertising as 'the discourse of visually harnessed
or applied power'. The main purpose of these visual signifiers is thus
to use shock techniques such as colorful lights and rapidly moving
signs, images or words to jolt the spectator from his/her reverie and
take notice of the surrounding. The textual message of advertising
placards is not as important as its visual effect, and customers are
expected to have acquired enough cultural knowledge to be able to
decipher subtle rhetoric and seemingly incompatible associations often
made in advertisements. Jon Goss also points out the hidden aim of
advertisement, which is to 'mask the materiality', of the commodity
and shift its identity from a material object to a cultural artifact.
This creates commodity fetishism in the Marxist sense i.e. severing
the commodity from its origins of production and the labor process
involved in producing it, and entrusting it with desirable
socio-cultural symbolism. This aspect of commodity displacement is
also reflected in the manner in which transactions take place in
retail showrooms of the Mall, where there is no interface between the
actual producer and consumer. A certain level of impersonality is
maintained and also the scope of negotiating prices is thwarted in
such transactions. Commodities are as such divested of their economic
properties, and replaced with a cultural context. It is for this
reason that a lot of care and emphasis is given to the exhibition of
these commodities in window displays.

The mall is a strategic or 'premeditated place'. Its interior design,
comprising of the general layout, placement of showrooms, escalators,
lifts, pathways, cooperative aestheticisation together serves to
manipulate consumer movement within the interior space in a way that
ensures maximum consumption. For instance, the layout of retail
showrooms is such that even when a consumer has to go to a specific
shop, 'on the way' to his goal, he is invariably exposed to a string
of shop fronts which make him pause and dally and deflect him from his
normal course to the initial desired destination. And often these
unplanned visits end up in huge purchases. Even the escalators are
strategically placed on opposite ends of the mall so as to subject
shoppers to optimal exposure of the shop fronts while they half
circumambulate along showrooms to reach the escalators.
Jon Goss in 'Magic of the Mall' provides a rather convincing account
of how cafeterias, restrooms and food courts play a role in sustaining
and thus prolonging long walks across retail showrooms by
shopper-pedestrians. The basic idea in all this is to keep the shopper
for as long as possible inside the mall. Promotional activities also
serve the same purpose of prolonging consumers' stay by providing
recreation while simultaneously promoting consumption.

It is interesting to note how music, light and window displays also
play an important role in monitoring pedestrian movement inside the
mall. While the mall adopts a uniform and cooperated mode of
aestheticisation and publicity, however each retail showroom tries to
lure customers particularly towards it by emphasizing its presence
through the regulation of light, music and shop front display, within
a limited sphere which does not disturb the overall décor of the mall.

Music forms an integral part of the mall sensorium as it pervades
every part of the mall-the entrance space, hallways, showrooms and
even the toilets. Music territorializes space and distinguishes
different spatial experiences. Music adds and contributes to the
aesthetic identity of the Mall and consumers' like and preference for
particular malls is considerably dependent on the kind of music it
plays. (In one of the online portals on Ghaziabad Malls, a teenager
reasoned out his preference for Shipra Mall over Pacific Mall and EDM
due to its 'tastefully' programmed music-which usually played English
numbers or tuned into world space. On the other hand the Pacific Mall
and EDM played Punjabi pops and popular Hindi songs according to the
general taste of the class of consumers it attracted-music considered
tacky by elite standards.) Sometimes promotional activities are
conducted which foreground and sensationalize music –such as in EDM,
when radio jockeys from the 'Radio Fever' channel hosted game shows,
dance competitions, and DJ shows.

As for attracting customers into the showrooms, the store managers
play loud music in comparison to the soft background music dispersed
all around in the mall, in sync with the general theme of the store
based on the kind and type of commodities it keeps. This music drowns
over the background music of the hallways and directs the consumer's
movement into the showrooms and also keeps them shopping for
longer. In a similar fashion light also directs consumer movement as
the hallways are dimly lit in comparison to the showrooms. Also shop
fronts use bright colorful lights to attract customers.

Window displays also play an important role in attracting customers to
retail showrooms. I will carry on this discussion in my next posting
where I'll also be looking at the place of the Multiplex inside the
mall and in the larger built environment.