Your videos V I B E 💯

Lived in Johnson City (and Jonesborough) since January 2018. I think I've been to the mall once when I first moved here just to look for shoes, not knowing the area.... Because I'm a man... and an adult I suppose. Very back roomsish though!

The Green marble, Gold cladded. Kiosk. Once sold Jewlrey and a large veriety of mid level watches. I rember standing at this looking over the selection back in 2009. I have no idea what the name was but they had a lot to look at. and good quality stuff at that. this was the era of the blinking Nokia cell phone antenna caps, that took no batteries, and lit up by the GSM signal transmitted when the call comes in. its one of those things "if ya know, ya know" what i'm reffering to. Oh' those were the days.

lots of brightly lit store fronts, and shiny displays help the overall look and feel of the space, one thing that stands out is the invisible shoppers..

I remember the Sears there, now we have to go to Lowes in JC or Jonesborough for Craftsman stuff, I've always heard there were all kinds of crazy tunnels under this mall where scary people hang out!

I live just right across the street from here, but I’ve never been in there before. I’ve only lived here for about two years tho. Good to know there’s a free indoor walking space!

chattanoogan here! i’m not old enough to remember eastgate ever being anything other than dead. i can’t prove this, but it sure looks like all the other malls in the county pretty much died when hamilton place opened.

I haven’t been to eastgate in a long time i live about 20min from there sad to see how it looks now :(

I grew up near Chattanooga in north ga- growing up eastgate mall was the closet mall so we went to eastgate frequently- we did all of our Christmas shopping there as well as at service merchandise which was was a home goods store that also sold expensive jewelry- we shopped for all our back to school clothes at eastgate and knart - we went to see movies at the theatre that was nearby - this brought back lots of memories- Hamilton place opened in 1987 and was the huge big mall that killed eastgate - currently eastgate houses businesses and govt services- i work for the state of tn and my current office is located inside the complex however it has become unsafe and dangerous with drive by shooting in the parking lot even in the daylight - i am glad to be working from home most of the time

I remember my dad managed the old radio shack here in the 80s. Mom would take me to Eastgate almost daily, it seemed. I took baton classes and we'd have exhibitions, they'd hold bird shows and at Halloween a carousel with store to store trick or treating. My grandmother adored Loveman's and I loved eating at Morrison's or even the little Chinese place, I forgot if it was imperial garden or jade garden, either way they were good. After retail started leaving I worked at a call center that had moved in, I was there in 2000 to 2002. I really miss the mall as it was when I was a kid. It was so fun.

I visited this mall a few months ago. I was surprised to see how well it was doing. Thanks for the history!

I’m from the Chattanooga area and I remember going here in the VERY early 2000s (2001-2002ish) with my mom and grandmother. Only one or two stores were left at that point. One being a Dollar Tree that we went to regularly until it too sadly closed. RIP Eastgate Mall

This mall was such a huge part of my youth. I spent so much time here and at the Toys R Us across the street when it was still open. I’ve never had the chance to see this with so few people inside. Thanks for the great video!

It's honestly kinda strange seeing my hometown featured

Since you made this video, some stores and kiosks have closed, but new ones are moving to replace them!

Oh man I live in Chattanooga and Eastgate is so depressing. I've always wanted to take my longboard thru there lol. Admittedly the fountain is pretty nice. The place has basically stayed the exact same over at least 20 years

This was my childhood mall. I was thinking of stopping there, didn’t know it had closed, as I moved to Athens for nearly a decade. I drove past the skeleton of Summit Mall, and it was depressing. I appreciate you stopping on the carousel. My sister and I used to beg my mom to go on it. I hope they didn’t just scrap it.

A lot of declining malls de-commissioned their fountains long ago. Nice to see this still had one, maybe a callout to the famous fountain in Savannah's Forsyth Park.

In the mide-70s, Dutch Square had a branch of Cromers Pnuts, a local Columbia institution whose motto (honest) was "Guaranteed Worst in Town." The mall location had several monkeys, kept in a glassed-in section at the rear of the store, kind of a creepy zoo for what passed as "entertainment" back in the day. Elsewhere in town, there was a carwash that kept a caged tiger. What were these people thinking?

The only thing that's missing is the "Toys R Us" that used to be across the street... a vacant lot now.

If I remember right, Goody's closed, came back, then closed again

I live here and go to the mall quite a bit..... this must have been a dead time.... One side of the mall is pretty dead but the other side usually has quite a bit going on

In the 90s when malls were booming, I had high school classes in this mall for one semester. This reminds me of how eerie and liminal the whole place was before the stores were open. The escalators were turned off, and besides some people who were working there setting things up, from time to time you’d see a few people walking around for exercise and that was it. I can see how such experiences must have inspired Silent Hill 3, because it really felt like you were somewhere you weren’t supposed to be, and like strange creatures could be lurking about. I miss the music store and book store, but with all things considered, the place is holding up. It’s cool that there’s a VR arcade there, and good sushi.

I was just at this mall over the weekend. I grew up outside Bristol, just about 20 minutes away... you should have seen this mall back at it's peek the mid-90s! Any given weekday evening it would be at full capacity like a Christmas mall scene from a 1980s film, just utterly packed on both the main floors. 🤔 It was so bad that on holidays you had to actually go to a neighboring mall because security would bar new people at some point in the evening from entering for safety concerns (meaning if you wanted to get something done, you had better be their earlier in the day). In 2006 there was a very popular videogame called _Dead Rising_ (a Dawn of the Dead type game) that was based on online images of this mall! They used a handful of remaining malls in the US (at the time) as reference, and this was the one that had the biggest inspiration for the interior layout of the mall in the game. These days the mall is a shell of what it was (even though the area is actually bigger than it used to be) thanks to all the new strip malls in the area - but compared to contemporary malls it's thriving. Oddly enough JC Penny used to be one of it's biggest Anchors. 🙃 *PS:* I wish you could have visited the Bristol Mall several years back. It was very much the opposite of the one in Kingsport. A extremely popular KZbinr called *Dead Malls* visited there when it was still opened, and said it was one of the creepiest malls he had ever seen. Most people refused to go there, because even in the 90s it was dying. When it closed it still had the early 1980s paint and decor (it's last paint job). Just a time capsule. Rumor was that a mafia-connected holding company (which turned out to be partially true) was involved in keeping it open for tax purposes, which is why it took so long to close it's doors - and I believe it has recently been sold to Hard Rock Cafe for a casino which they are currently breaking ground on! You wouldn't have wanted to walk around there early in the morning or at night, lol. 😅

Grew up in the Milwaukee area. This place and Memorial Mall in Sheboygan were my hangouts. This hurts my soul, but thank you for this video. Very well done.

I like how this mall mixes the old (retro colors) with the new and modern..so many malls have gone with this flat colorless vibe 😝. Hope this one stays!

What killed this mall was the shift in demographics in the surrounding area. It went from middle, upper-middle, and upper-class neighborhoods and businesses to lower middle-class and lower-class neighborhoods and lots of illegal aliens. FedGov and the Housing Authority destroyed the entire area.

As a recent subscriber, I’ve been longing for your next video Kristin. You and all DMOD creators are my tops. Just so excited to see this retro mall thriving. That’s the kind of stories I like to hear, that mall owners don’t need to make huge updates. And that they can still keep these structures dated giving them a surreal nostalgic feel of the time when they were built. The pillars, fountains, ceilings, the colors, the lightings, the planters, and conversation pits should be left alone. Awesome job Kristin in bringing us this walk through nostalgia. 👍

I came here semi-regularly from around 2000 to 2010 with my grandma or sometimes my mom, but I wasn't a mall kid and was really only interest in the Gamestop and picking up a Metallica shirt or something at the Hot Topic. I do remember a sandwich shop that was to the left of the escalators that gave out free samples all the time to drum up business. Never ate there because they were pricey, but the the samples were great. Sorry for such limited insight.

born in 1980 near this mall it's been booming my whole life

So many memories of Savannah mall. It’s hurts to see it like this.

Ugh this place is a dump! I do not plan on ever going back.

I live in the Tri Cities. Thanks for showing our mall! The Fort Henry Mall in Kingsport TN is a decent building, but mostly vacant with just a few stores, mall walkers, and the movie theater. Sad really. Safe travels!

Good to see you again Kirsten, what a little gem this mall is! It’s nice to hear that it’s doing well 😊👍🏻

That is a BIG forever 21, so clean! I also love the polka dotted pink store.

Came as a big surprise!

This is a good-looking mall. That floor! Loads of fantastic tile. Thanks for another great cruise, Kristin!

Exelent video great vaporwave music!❤❤

This aesthetic is very much a vibe. I appreciate that this place still has that classic aesthetic, but adds modern conveniences like the places to sit that have the charging stations. I wish more thriving malls would look unique like this, instead of the Simonization we constantly see.

NEXT EPISODE: Marna breaks into Unicomm Studios and records the voiceover and uploads a secret episode. The dead mall world now has an APB out for Dead Mall Marna! 🚔🚨

Good call on the fancy versus mid Belk! It’s always fun seeing a Belk in some of the rural or old strip malls during by travels… I want to stop in but then I luckily remember it’s the low end Belk, not fancy Belk. 😂😂😂 They should rebrand to “Fancy Balk” and “We’re a nicer than Gabes” signage at the proper locations.

Thanks for taking the time to create and share this

What young person says: "I want to make intentionally uninspiring music when I grow up"?

This mall reminds me of a wing of my local mall that was built around 2000. That black and blue and peach tile screams the era. Beautiful mall and glad to see it doing well. Thanks for filming!!

2:40 get him a cigarette and some pink glasses and he's your old logo. So strange to see a horse depicted in a sitting position like that.

Could you make a video on the Kingsport mall? I really like ur videos❤

Most malls are abandoned and in dystopian ruins. This is like a trip back to the 80s and 90s------amazing survivor!

Not just a survivor but thriving 😊

2024 update the elder beerman is now a vender mall called peddlers junction. The part of the mall where the play area, Maurice’s, and all of those empty spaces is is now being constructed as an Ollie’s bargain outlet which ended up closing part of the mall.

I wish i could visit Walkabout Sallys