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All we are familiar with a global phenomenon of the shopping mall, which has its roots in ancient outdoor bazaars where people would go to buy goods from local artisans, farmers and craftsmen. But the shopping malls we visit today appeared in the beginning of the 20th century. They have grown much to cover the major cities of the world in a few different forms. Nowadays shopping malls are not only place to find and purchase goods; they are also known as cultural hot spots where people of all ages do interactions. But checking malls reviews, you will definitely come across some criticism to shopping malls, specifically strip malls.
Shopping malls are known to be indoor shopping centers. Some of them have outdoor areas. There are shops which have their own indoor space. As it was already mentioned the idea of shopping malls came from old covered marketplaces that were popular between the 10th and 15th centuries, when some of such markets are even still around today. The first purposely-built shopping center was created in 1785. But the first shopping mall as we consider it today appeared in the United States in 1916. During the 1950s, large indoor shopping malls began actively to spring up all over the world, mostly in Paris and London. After automobiles and suburbs sprung up, strip malls appeared. Those were the first shopping centers which were built outside of downtown areas.
The shopping malls are similar and different at the same time. Thus a few different types of shopping malls should be noted. It is necessary to mention that average shopping mall is 400,000 square feet. There are those which are between 400,000 and 800,000 square feet, they are known as regional. As they are much larger and usually do accommodate higher end stores that need more space for their stores. There are also Super-regional malls, which size is more than 800,000 square feet. Strip malls which were already mentioned in the article are strictly suburban shopping centers that usually consist of large parking lots which are surrounded by single story shops. Outlet malls are considered to be special shopping malls, where manufacturers do have their own stores and sell their products directly through them.
According to malls reviews, the first shopping malls mainly include just independent shops. They also have some food vendors scattered throughout. Not much time had passed before food courts appeared to give consumers a central place to eat. Among the addition that shopping malls got through the 20th century were department stores. Those appeared when large finances were needed to keep bigger shopping running.
The West Edmonton Mall in Alberta, Canada was the largest shopping center in the world in the period from 1986 to 2004. But just four years after that it became the fourth largest. That shows the rapid growth of shopping malls nowadays. Today the largest mall in the world is considered to be the recently opened Mall of Arabia, which is planned to be built as part of the City of Arabia in the Dubailand theme park premises in Dubai. The mall will be 929,000 square meters in size. The first phase of the mall is expected to be opened in 2013. The second and third largest shopping malls are respectfully located in China and Malaysia.
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