State reasons for dead shopping malls and refunctioned shopping mall cases

Shopping and purchasing activities, one of most basic actions of mankind, have always actualized at different places in every period and civilization. Actions related with shopping that carried out at public buildings and city squares in ancient and medieval cities; has shifted out of the city centers via shopping malls that emerged in the 20th century. In 1956, architect Victor Gruen designed Southdale Center at Minnesota suburbs, and his building become the ancestor of modern shopping malls with enclosed and fully air-conditioned interior spaces. After the Southdale Center, modern shopping malls spread to all over the world. The Galleria shopping mall opened in 1988 at İstanbul, is first modern shopping mall in our country and has initiated a new development process. Nowadays, shopping malls are rather than providing community's demands; they have become the urban focal points that reflect the socio-cultural characteristics of the society with the sporting practices, cultural activities, entertainment and recreation areas, restaurants, cafes with in them. As result of reasons such as socio-economic and social changes in the 21th century, over-retailing, intense competition, development of e-commerce, mistaken architectural, locational and urban planning decisions; shopping malls have begun to lose functions especially in developed countries. Old and physically outdated shopping malls enters the decline process and lose popularity, in the face of shopping malls that built with the latest fashion design trends and offers more exciting activities. Declined shopping malls become non-functional areas and brings physical and economic depression not for just themselves, but also sinks nearby of their built environment and creates dead spaces. Therefore, various redevelopment and adaptive reuse projects have begun to implement for the dead malls both USA and Turkey. There are many advantages of refunctioning dead malls, such as sustainability and slowing down the urban sprawl. Within the scope of the thesis, shopping malls that transformed into different uses in these countries have been investigated. In this context, several functions observed that are primarily suitable for the use of shopping malls. In addition, different types of interventions made to the shopping malls expressed with various architectural criterias. It is aimed that the data presented in this study, shed light on the new studies and applications to be made in the future.