My sister’s ultimate dream was realised the other week when it was revealed that a bunch of ingenious artists had set up home in a shopping centre.

Or mall rather, since these bohos were of the American variety, and were in it for the artistic experience not the cut-price shoes.

That’s right, eight creative types set up house on a 750 square-foot storage space in a mall cark par in Providence, Rhode Island (just try that down your local Tesco).

pic: anonova

Not only did they construct a cinder block wall and manage to install a door, they also ferried furniture to the secret spot right under the noses of intrepid shoppers.

Marks, then, for bravery or perhaps for bare-faced cheek - and a Turner Prize for blagging to Michael Townsend, the 36 year-old chief instigator who insisted in court that this was all about the art.

He and his buddies, he said, wanted to “explore the phenomenon of the modern American enclosed mall, its social implications, and [his] own relationship with commerce and the world”.

I’m not quite sure if I’m buying that story, and neither did the judge who dished out a six month probation sentence for trespassing. But mall spokesperson, Dante Bellini Jr., was not amused by this leniency:

“It was wrong on a number of levels… It was like a person breaking into your basement or your car at night and sleeping there. We certainly feel violated.”

Violated?! How so? Well, for Bellini this wasn’t just an affront to the laws of the land, it was also an affront to good architectural design - he went on to comment, rather cattily, that the space was just “an area with stuff in it”.

Somewhere, most likely a stripped-down, backlit, steel-supported building site, Kevin McCloud is rolling his eyes in horror.

Related Tags: General, Design, Squat, American, Kevin McCloud

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