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David Avetisian
Professor Koning
English 113B
7 March 2014
Americana at Brand: The Fantasized Dream
It's like a fantasy world, it's unbelievable, there are so many beautiful and unique designs.
Shaped like a rectangle, with apartments above, you hear the sound of buzzing down below. The
smooth music of jazz playing softly as you walk around. From the luxurious stores to the food
courts there is plenty to see, in the center of it all, extraordinarily beautiful, there is a fountain
which goes off once every hour or so. The fountain attracts more than 50% of the people
there,(survey) the way the water goes up and down is picture perfect, and also how the water
splashes when it goes back down, it's all an amazing and beautiful show. As the sun starts to set
the lights start to go on and when they do it becomes a place of beauty.
This is the Americana at Brand. This is the fantasy world that is unbelievably beautiful
with its unique designs. The Americana is located on 889 Americana Way, Glendale, CA 91210.
The Americana is one of the few malls in the world to have apartments above it, and at the same
time people living there. It is one of the most interesting and fascinating places to visit around
the entire world. The Americana is one of the few places that will give you this amazing feeling
of fantasy, it is also right next to the Glendale Galleria which is another attractive mall in the city
of Glendale. The owner and developer of the Americana at Brand also owns The Grove is Rick J.
Caruso, and both of these outstanding malls were built in the center of the city to attract as much
attention and shoppers as they possibly can. While many people think the Americana is only an
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entertainment center, the Americana was mainly built to sell, to attract shoppers and people who
will spend their money.
The Americana was designed to create a want for unnecessary merchandise, which
basically put "consumption in our veins"(Macklemore). With the consumption in our veins we
start to get addicted into shopping and buying certain merchandise that is not necessary to buy.
Some of the consequences to this will be that less people might want to go to the Americana just
to hang out. Consumerism plays a big role for the Americana because its built to be one of the
top malls, with the top stores, it's basically a high-class mall for upper-class people. Waste is also
a big factor especially in malls, waste could be anything, such as advertisements, food, paper
bags, etc. Waste can change the entire atmosphere depending how well it is managed, in the
Americana waste is managed outstandingly well, which is why the Americana is one of the most
cleanest malls around. There are also social class topics which come up when talking about
certain shopping centers, and for the Americana there certainly are specific social classes the
Americana is aiming to attract to itself and its mainly for the upper-class people. The
Americana's main goal is to make money and in order for them to do that it will take them to
commercialize their space, making it look like the best place to possibly shop at. The Americana
does not want people going to the Americana just to hang out or window shop, its main goal is to
get people to shop there and actually spend their money. The Americana also has gender
favorites, such as women. It is obvious that most of the shoppers at almost any shopping center
are women, so in that case the Americana is built to mainly attract women with many specific
stores which most women like. The Americana also tries to attract tourists, who are also people
that will most likely spend their money there.
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The Americana also does not want specific people to be there, they try to avoid people
such as the homeless or any other type of people who could possibility scare away their
customers. According to Mike Davis throughout all of Los Angeles this same thing is going on.
Davis said that the city of Los Angeles is intentionally using methods to shop people from doing
certain things, for example they purposely build all of the benches near bus stops uncomfortable
to lay down on and also they put sprinklers in the grass to keep the homeless away (161). The
same methods are being used at the Americana, there are gates around the grass and the grass
always seems to be wet. The Americana does this by making sure they have a lot of police
patrolling the area day in and night out. There are always police patrolling left and right and the
Americana was also built similar to a fortress-like space which also shows that it is also a private
area. The Americana also has gates surrounding the grass because they don't want it to be a free
and open area to be. The main reason they have gates around the grass is because they don't want
people just laying down, they want people to be walking around and going store to store to spend
their money, they also don't want the homeless going to the Americana to lay on the grass.
The Americana's location is just perfect, it's in the center area of Glendale and on a very
popular street called Brand, which makes attracting the shoppers and consumers to the
Americana easier. It is in the southern portion of downtown within the central Glendale project
area. It is also in the center of almost all of the shops and stores of the city, and of the street
called Brand. The Americana is not only a shopping center, it also has apartments which people
live in. The Americana is really unique there have never been any other types of malls like it.
The Americana officially opened on May 2, 2008 and the owner of the Americana is Rick
Caruso. The Americana has a lot surrounding it, such as hotels, restaurants, and other apartment
buildings. The parking lot is really huge, it has a lot of space, it is also spiral and has a unique
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design to it. The Americana at Brand has 75 retail shops, 100 condominiums, and 238 apartments
(website). The Americana also has the Asian decorations which represents the Luna New Year
celebration which certainly attracts many Asians from around the world, this idea which was
Rick Caruso's idea, was really smart because he is trying to attract many Asian people to this
space and by doing so it will only benefit him because there are so any Asian people around the
world and most of the have the money to spend. The Americana has food courts, restaurants, and
a Pacific Theater where movies could be watched, the movie theater attracts many people to the
Americana which is one of the very important aspects of the Americana. There is also an Apple
Store at the Americana which is really popular around the entire world, and many people like to
go shopping or wandering around inside Apple Stores. The trolley and fountain really bring a lot
of attraction and good attention to the Americana, but the trolley does not function all day, when
it gets busy at the Americana it does not move from place to place because it would cause chaos
and people would have to move a lot and that would certainly get annoying and dangerous.
At the Americana, my group and I did questionnaires and while doing them we
encountered many problems. The security caught one of us and said that it is illegal to do surveys
at the Americana so from that point on we had to be cautious. There were also many people
unsure if it was safe to do the surveys, so many questions were asked. The total outcome of the
survey was quite surprising, the age groups were fairly equal but the 18-20 range had the most
people, the main reason people were at the Americana was to either shop or watch a movie. The
surprising part of the survey was that there were more male's than female's. The majority of the
household income was ranging from 26,000-40,000 a year, and finally the ethnicity's that we
mostly encountered were either White or Asian. Most of the time people come to the Americana
for the movies, shopping, or to spend a quality time there with friends and family. The
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Americana is one of the most well-known mall's around this area, if not around the world, it's
name is attention grabbing and unique, it is just a spectacular place to spend your time, shop, or
to even just be at.















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Works Cited
"Americana at Brand." Web. 19 Feb 2014.
<http://www.strongcitiesstrongstate.com/success/glendale/americana-brand>.
Roger , Vincent. Improvements in store for rival downtown Glendale malls. 2013. Photograph.
Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles. Web. 19 Feb 2014.
Caruso, Rick J. "Americana." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 16 Feb. 2014. Web. 04 Mar.
2014
Macklemore. "Previous Story." Popdust. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Mar. 2014.
Davis, Mike. Fortress Los Angeles: The Militarization of Urban Space. New York, 1992. Print.
Brown, Rachel. "Nordstrom's New Americana Home." WWD 19 Sept. 2013: 7. General OneFile,
Web. 6 Feb. 2014
"True Religion Opens New Store at the Americana at Brand in Glendale, CA." Business Wire,
(2008)
"Caruso Launches Free Trolley Service for the City of Glendale at the Americana at Brand"
Business Wire, (2010)
"Developer Targeting Mall Neighbors Caruso Wants to Expand Glendale's Americana at Brand:
Caruso Wants to Expand Glendale's Americana at Brand" Daily News, (2010)
(C) Papers: Represent an adequate level of writing that satisfies basic assignment requirements only.

Demonstrates some sense of audience and purpose.
Presents an adequate title that introduces the essay.
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The topic is defined only generally. Thesis is present but is also general and is possibly
inadequate and/or ill-conceived. Support is often obvious and easily accessible, demonstrating
little awareness of the topics complexity or other points of view.
There is an attempt to cite outside sources of information.
Paragraphs are adequately organized, but contain only modest levels of focus and support
necessary to effectively illustrate assertions or represent clear, connected units of thought.
Paragraphs occasionally lack topic sentences and the use of transitions may be mechanical but
foster coherence.
Sentences demonstrate lapses in proofreading/editing with enough careless mistakes to
significantly catch a readers attention in a negative manner and affect readability. Sentence
structure is relatively simple, exhibiting little or no variety.
Essay contains a minimally acceptable level of detail, rhetorical control, and critical thinking.