the Gruen Transfer, a phenomenon that architecture theorist Sanford Kwinter describes as “a threshold, the moment when a shopper’s purposive behavior and directed, coherent bodily movements break down under the barrage of excessive, narrow-spectrum stimulation and continual interruption of attention.” These conditions follow directly from the mall’s physical layout—its architecture, decor, lighting, and soundscape. “The unconsciously bewildered shopper, rendered docile, cannot help but drift into the prepared pathways and patterns of externally induced consumer activity, unfocused but exquisitely suggestible to gentle but firm environmental cues.”
✉️Fwd: #196: I Care Because You Do
Josh Beckman