Houston’s Most Eerie Backrooms — From Dead Malls To IAH’s Secret Subway, Liminal Spaces Abound

The runaway success of A24’s Backrooms, which became the studio’s highest grossing movie ever by racking in $212.6 million in its first 10 days of release, has brought backrooms — or more accurately, liminal spaces — into the forefront. Nostalgiacore junkies know this eerie phenomenon can be found almost anywhere, provided one knows where to look.

Including right here in Houston.

For the uninitiated, liminal spaces are “in-between” places — sites that exists for one to go through, rather than linger in. Think of airports, train stations, parking lots, hallways, etc. Liminality can also be found in places that were once occupied but have since been abandoned. These include dead malls, empty houses, schools at night — or department store backrooms. The appeal is often less about the physical places themselves than the feeling they evoke — nostalgia, loneliness, mystery and even horror.

Longtime enthusiasts enjoy visiting and photographing these dreamlike, memory-rich places. For those who wish to step out of reality for a moment, these are the Most Eerie Backrooms or Liminal Spaces in Houston:

Hong Kong Food Market

This Asian grocery store has been around since at least the early aughts and has remained virtually unchanged — well, according to my parents, who immigrated to Houston from Taiwan in the 1990s. With its fluorescent lighting, worn tile floors, faded signage and the four-color stripe motif running across the walls, Hong Kong Food Market looks like it ought to be viewed on a glitchy VHS tape.

POST Houston

Like many liminal spaces, the story of POST Houston begins with an abandoned place. The former Barbara Jordan Post Office was sold in 2015 to Lovett Commercial, which transformed the 16-acre site into a food hall with art, entertainment and even co-working spaces. These days, POST is almost always bustling.

Try stopping by on a quieter mid-week afternoon, take a pause in one of the cool, concrete pillar-lined corridors and you’ll understand why it deserves to be on this list. Bonus: If you’re a fan of the vaporwave genre of liminal space, check out one of the second-floor bathrooms.

Just trust me.

PlazAmericas

Originally called Sharpstown Center when it opened in 1961, this place experienced its heyday in the 1970s and 1980s as one of southwest Houston’s most successful malls. In 2009, the center was renamed PlazAmericas and renovated with a focus on catering to the local Hispanic population.

A 2000s kid stepping into PlazAmericas today — with its angular architecture and Factory Pomo-esque signage — is sure to feel like they’re reentering a mall from a distant childhood memory.

MeowWolf Houston: Radio Tave

The mega-popular, nationally renowned art company’s Houston installation may not be liminal in and of itself, but it’s certainly full of spaces and passageways that feel plucked out of another reality. A favorite room of mine is The Amalgam, the focal point of which is an enormous vortex of everyday objects — furniture, toys, clothes, kitchen appliances — creating a structure both alien and horrifyingly familiar.

Other Backrooms worthy sights at Meow Wolf include a radio station office that morphs into a neon aquarium; spaces where lamps and furniture hang from the ceiling and sofas melt into the floor; and a honky-tonk bar that exists between heaven and hell.

The Galleria Upper Levels

From photographs of the time, The Galleria in the 1970s was very atmospheric. Houston’s signature mall has gone through quite a bit of modernization since then. But in some parts of the mall, the ghost of that era is ever present.

Take one of the six centrally located elevators up to Level 3, where some of the old black metal balustrades still remain. A few businesses, some shuttered offices and scant air conditioning are all that remain in this quiet part of The Galleria.

If you’re still feeling adventurous, travel up to Level 6. The walkways up there offer an excellent view of identical circular balconies and dusty office windows that seem to repeat ad infinitum.

Downtown Tunnel System

Located 20 feet under the streets and running more than six miles long, Houston’s Tunnel System connects numerous skyscrapers across Downtown Houston. Though liminal by definition, these tunnels offer far more than just a passageway from one building to another — plenty of restaurants, cafes, newsstands and even hair salons operate down here.

Be careful exploring the emptier, more remote corridors though. You wouldn’t want to end up in the wrong dimension.

Ólafur Elíasson Tunnel at MFAH

This is another Houston tunnel, but this one will literally transform you. Icelandic artist Elíasson’s tunnel, titled Sometimes an underground movement is an illuminated bridge, is a permanent installation that connects the MFAH’s Nancy and Rich Kinder Building and the Glassell School of Art. Enter the passageway, and watch as the monochromatic yellow lights seep color from your clothes, skin and hair.

It almost transports you into a world from a black-and-white film.

IAH’s Airport Subway

The first time I ended up in George Bush Intercontinental Airport’s underground subway, I was frankly terrified. The below-ground train that travels between Terminals A, B, C, D/E, and the Airport Marriott hotel includes stations that are pretty much devoid of color, decoration, or anything remotely hospitable

If not for the presence of other travelers around me, I might have thought I actually noclipped out of reality. Learning that this underground train was designed by Disney Imagineers (yes, seriously) only adds to the surrealness.  

Yes, Houston can go liminal with the best of them. What are your favorite H-Town Backrooms?