Galleria Americana

Just 10 minutes away from Altadena, Glendale is the location of two famous shopping malls. Americana and Galleria. I had already visited Glendale when, during my very first week in LA, , in search for a spare for the car, I had gone to Brand Avenue in Glendale. Brand Ave. is a sort off gigantic open air multi-dealers boulevard dedicated to the 20th century horse. This time rather than from the south I reached Glendale going west on the 210/134. Glendale was already an LA large suburb (now about 200 thousands) but in the '70s saw a major development because also because of being at the meeting point of two freeways, the Glendale Fwy (now calle n 2) and the Ventura Fwy(not called 134). I landed from the freeway again on Brand but close to the hills and started to descend. The Galleria, the oldest of the two shopping malls opened in 1976 and department stores plus a multitude of restaurants and shops. It is the mall as we have seen in movies and television, as we have read in novels and essays. For the pleasure of either those who knows about Walter Benjamin and those who don't, the word "galleria" was adopted in mid nineteenth century as a translation of the word "arcade" which was used in english and french "passage" to indicate the new temples of shoppings, covered lighted streets. Surving in Italy today two in Turin, one in Milan and one in Naples.

The mall has three levels and fountains. People walks and window shops, as it is usual there is one end which is more up-market and another more popular where the department store is located, here is slightly more complicated for the presence of 5 department stores.

To immerse better myself in the mall I got myself a shopping task, finding a new pair of swimming trunks. The one bought in New Haven are worn out and almost transparent on my buttocks. Thus I visited shops, and looked at windows, and at people, asked sale assistants, and with some hopes I entered a couple of sport stores. But in the US, whether east or west coast, to find a swimming trunk and not trousers you need a specialized shop, in the entire department store I was not able to find one pair of swimming trunks made for swimming.

Time to move to the next one. The two malls close both at 9 pm. The construction of Americana, started in 2005 and it kicked open in 2008. It is a mall of new generation, open air, with a number of pedestrian streets around a central square; cinema and restaurants tends to be located in this central focus place. A fountains plays with water and there is even a street-car, red, circling around the entire area.

The entire mall is built to resemble to an east coast southern city, Charleston as it was in the 1940s. I've been told that Charleston did not have a street-car back then. In any case the inspiration is generally southern states. Buildings are 4 storey, the ground floor is shops the rest looks like they are flats. Large billboards invite people to come and live there. Abandon reality, come and live in the Centre.

Maybe because I arrive at 8 but I am struck by a couple of things, one is the performative character that the place impress onto the people. The number of people who have dressed up to go to the mall is clearly superior to those in the Galleria where people are just dressed casually. The second is the great spectacle of eating: restaurants are filled with people who, disregarding the tacky golden apollo/superman/athlete statue at the center forged in pure capitalist realism style, are performing their dining out with formalized poses and attitudes. The non blasé among them enjoy looking at the elaborated water games of the central fountain, maybe uncounsciously longing for an off-night of sprinkles and spoutings. One of the building has an elevator tower, on top of it something that reminds me of both an water well structure and the Eiffel Tower, the entire structure it looks like a multilevel hotel by its entrance, but nobody checks me at the entrance, when I get to the second level I realize it is the parking. The mall is all at ground level, but the parking lot has 7 levels!