Shopping malls are making a comeback! At least, according to HGTV stars Joey Lawrence and Melissa Joan Hart.
The pair—who are currently starring in the newest competition series, “Totally ’90s House”—pitched the idea for a mall renovation series during a recent interview.
Totally ’90s Mall
“I think we’ve also moved into a space where it’s about warmth again. It’s about family. It’s less sterile,” Keshia Knight Pulliam said during an interview on the “So Bad It’s Good with Ryan Bailey” show earlier this month. “And the ’90s were very, very family. And when you look at anything from design or you know just the world, everything’s cyclical. Everything comes back around. So it may be in a little updated more updated way but everything recycles you know so so when you look at things it’s a more modern twist on decades before.”
“Totally ’90s House” teammate Joey Lawrence jumped in to remark on recent changes he’s noticed in shopping malls, a once nearly-extinct entertainment hub.
“I love the Instagram posts that are going around right now where they how like shopping malls from the ’90s versus today,” he said. “Bro the ’90s malls were the best dude. They were just so colorful. Like Keshia was saying, there’s so many colors. It’s so warm. You walk through those malls and it just the vibrant colors and everything. And now you walk through them and it’s almost like an asylum.”
The “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” star added, “Malls are coming back. My son spent his whole summer at the mall.”
After hearing that, host Ryan Bailey suggested an idea for a spinoff series called “That ’90s Mall,” where the cast redesigns a shopping mall.
Melissa, Joey and Keshia were immediately on board!
“I think that would be amazing. I don’t know what the budget would be on that, but let’s do it,” Melissa said.
“We got a built-in alliteration, too. We call it Mall Makeover, baby. We got it,” Joey added.
Back to the ’90s
The stars of the hit series went on to the everyday items from the ’90s that they still feel nostalgic about.
“I wish voicemail…I would like an answering machine,” the “Clarissa Explains It All” star said. “You have to wait till I get home to check my messages instead of just assuming I’m going to be available all the time. I would like that.”
Joey added, “I would say from the from from the 90s, I mean, as as old school as it is, I I would love to be able to still have Blockbuster Video Night.”
“Honestly, I really miss it. I miss the destination, the specificity of setting a time to watch it. I feel like now when we gather, we spend most of our time just like scroll searching trying to find something to watch. And I hate that,” he continued. “We waste more time than we just would get in the damn car, go to Blockbuster, pick out a video, bring it home, have some popcorn, and watch together. Like I much prefer that. I miss that so much.”
