Black Friday: Ghostly Images of Abandoned Malls by Seph Lawless (PHOTOS)

They're typically bustling with activity, packed during the winter holiday shopping season or teeming with families during the summer break, but the shopping malls in this selection of photos by photographerSeph Lawless are ghostly and eerie as they are left to succumb to the elements.

The two Ohio shopping malls in this slideshow above — Rolling Acres Mall and Randall Park Mall — were both built in the the mid-1970s and abandoned in 2008 and 2009. Both malls, which now feature dead plants, broken glass and crumbling walls, are set to be demolished any day now.

(VIDEO: How Weather Affects an Abandoned Building Left to Rot)

"There's nothing more profound and sobering then being inside an abandoned mall," said Lawless. "It's a powerful symbol of America's economic decline. I used to visit these malls often growing up. I remember eating cotton candy underneath the escalator and the sounds of people laughing and feet shuffling as the gentle sounds of falling water from one of the many fountains surrounded me. This was America."

Lawless' photos of abandoned shopping malls are collected in a new book, Black Friday - The Collapse of the American Shopping Mall.

Lawless is known for exploring abandoned spaces and documenting their imminent collapse. In 2012, he set out across the United States to photograph the "most broken parts of America." He came back with approximately 3,000 images and 17 hours of video footage. This year, Lawless released his book, Autopsy of America, a culmination of that work.

(MORE: Abandoned Buildings of Forgotten Cleveland)

And while abandoned buildings dot the landscape of the American Rust Belt, photos of these decaying and boarded-up shopping malls,  once iconic cultural phenomena, may seem disturbing. But they shouldn't be surprising. About 15 percent of U.S. malls will fail or be converted into non-retail space within the next 10 years, according to Green Street Advisors, a real estate and REIT analytics firm, Business Insider reported.

But Lawless is planning to turn the collapse of the American mall into something positive. He is currently setting up small kiosks at active, operating malls in the surrounding suburbs to sell prints of the photos of the decaying malls, with all proceeds going to the Ohio Association of Foodbanks.