The former Metrocenter Mall in Phoenix, Arizona. Photograph by Jesse Rieser
By Jessica Testa | New York Times
PHOENIX — The body parts come as a surprise, even if you expect them, when they’re the only things left behind.
When a mall has closed — its stores shuttered by recession, new spending habits or a deadly virus — the mannequins sometimes remain. They’re stripped and dismembered, their detached legs propped against bare walls and severed hands thrown into abandoned back rooms. The mall has become a “dead mall,” emptied of people and their products.
But not everything is gone; there are still the things nailed down, like counters and display cases, or scattered, like the fake body parts.
