The Architecture of the Strip Mall, Reconsidered
An unfashionable defense of a much-mocked form.
The strip mall is the most honest building type we have produced in a century - it promises nothing it does not deliver, which may be why we cannot forgive it.
It is fashionable to mock the strip mall as the nadir of American architecture, and on aesthetic grounds the case is not hard to make. On honesty grounds, the case is considerably weaker.
A strip mall never pretends to be a cathedral. Its flat facade, its parking lot, its single load-bearing purpose - get people in, sell them something, let them leave - are all stated plainly, with none of the ornamental lying that grander buildings often do.
I am not arguing the strip mall is beautiful. I am arguing it is one of the few building types left that tells you exactly what it is for at a glance, and that this kind of clarity is its own rare, undervalued virtue.
