Located in Los Angeles, California, The Grove is an outdoor entertainment center engineered to perfection. Realistically, it appears to be an outdoor mall home to famous chain stores such as Nordstrom, Banana Republic,  and Forever 21. A movie theater, dancing fountains, a food court serving ethnic foods, and well-known eateries including The Cheesecake Factory and Starbucks are intertwined flawlessly between these stores.

Lights, Camera...Shop!

But don’t be fooled- The Grove is more than just a mall. It is a lifestyle center, the name given by the International Council of Shopping Centers to places “with an open-air configuration; and at least 50,000 square feet of space occupied by upscale national chain specialty stores.” The Grove comes complete with cobblestone streets and perfectly crafted architecture to have a “Wisteria Lane” appeal.

One after the other, these outdoor lifestyle centers are popping up all over the U.S. They are made to create downtown atmospheres in suburbia. According to Jamie Reno of Newsweek, in December of 2006, there were already 150 lifestyle centers, with 100 more on the way. But why are these super fake shopping centers so appealing to today’s society? It may be because, as Jean Baudrillard, writer of Simulacra and Simulation puts it, people have become so reliant on symbols and signs that they have lost contact with the real world. Or maybe because mother nature cannot compete with the alluring charm felt by walking through the mimicked main streets of these “Disney-esque” designs.

It is tempting to visit these places, especially after reading that celebrities such as Heidi Klum and Janet Jackson have been to The Grove, but how far from reality are people willing to go? This fake version of upscale living is too good to be true, because it’s not true. There are no synchronized dancing fountains in the real world, only in over-the-top places of fantasy and thrill like the Bellagio in Las Vegas, and now The Grove in Los Angeles. It seems fitting for these fountains to be in a place home to the motto, “What Happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas,” but a little out of character for them to be in this L.A. shopping center.

Another surreal aspect of The Grove is its food court made to mimic ethnic food markets. Rumor has it that the waiters talk in fake foreign accents. Why do tourists put up with these faux accents when they can easily find authentic ethnic foods elsewhere in L.A?

According to Cybele Weisser of Money, these mega-malls “offer more to their shoppers than just shopping.” With free concerts in the park and trolley rides to the nearby farmer’s market, The Grove is the ipitomy of instant gratification wrapped in a perfect  shiny bow.  Visitors fail to see that what they are experiencing is superficial and manipulated to make them “spend, spend, spend,” says Weisser.

Should we be worried about the appeal of these faux-reality shopping experiences?  They seem at such odds with the reality of today’s economic recession and other woes.  Is this escape more dangerous than other forms? Or simply more eerie?
Erica Nicole.