market stalls – Modern Mooch

Claremont St Shrewsbury SY1 1HQ

Courtesy: Mr Christopher Marsden

The Market Hall was considered to be a prime example of cutting edge modern architecture when it was officially opened amid a blaze of publicity and civic pageantry on September 16 1965.

It replaced a large Victorian market hall of similar proportions that was in a poor state of repair and was condemned as unhygienic, dingy and “no longer fit for purpose”.

Developed by the Second Covent Garden Property Company, the new Market Hall cost £1 million to build and was designed by a respected architect of his day, David du Rieu Aberdeen. Aberdeen designed major buildings in London and made his name when he won a national competition to design Congress House for the TUC in Bloomsbury. Today Congress House is described as a “modernist masterpiece”.

The Pevsner Architectural Guide pronounced the new Market Hall “a good example of modern architecture”, with “its clean lines and simple forms. But the town’s timber-framed tradition is also evoked. The upper storey is jettied out on a reinforced concrete structure and faced with vertical fins in an echo of close studding,” it stated. “The tall slender red brick clock tower mingles effectively in distant views with the town’s medieval steeples.”

Shrewsbury Market Hall

Two sculptors Keith Ashford and Liz Turner of Sculpture Logic, recreated the 37′ tower finial to mark the 50th anniversary of the market in 2015.

Shropshire Live

Derby’s Eagle Market, which has been open for nearly 50 years, is set to close for good in around six months from now. The indoor market is expected to shut down in March, traders were told in a memo late last month.

The long-standing city centre market has undergone major changes since opening in 1975. Over the past 46 years, dozens of traders have come and gone, from fruit and veg sellers to fine clothes retailers, pottery makers.

The nut stall that is greatly missed by nut fans.

Singer Frankie Vaughan opens Jack’s Rainwear at the market in 1976.

When it first opened, the venue was a maze of hexagonal stalls, which gave it a futuristic look, but it was a confusing layout and it was difficult to navigate and find the stall you wanted. The hexagons came down in 1990 in favour of a more traditional, open layout which made the market easier to escape in the event of a fire.

The Modernist modular structure replaced by a higher High-Tech roofing solution.

Petes Heel bar will be missed, along with his missing apostrophe.

Text and Photographs – Derby Telegraph

The redevelopment masterplan includes new homes and commercial uses with new public spaces and walkable streets that will integrate the site with the rest of the City Centre and improve new connections to the river. There is scope to introduce some tall buildings to make better use of the site with new food and beverage, leisure and other activity at ground floor level. The proposals will contribute towards the Council’s vision in a way that responds positively to the site context including surrounding character areas.

Derby Cathedral Quarter