Mercato Centrale and the street market

The iron-and-glass pavilion of Mercato Centrale was completed in eighteen seventy-four. The sellers for whom it was built did not come here. For seven years, the new market stood without a real market.

The story began when Florence became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy. The main food trade then took place at Mercato Vecchio—where Piazza della Repubblica now stands. Deliveries and removals of goods filled the narrow streets with carts; the sewers could not cope with waste from the meat and fish stalls. The architect Giuseppe Poggi, who was overseeing the redevelopment of the new capital, urged Mayor Ubaldino Peruzzi to move trade out of the ancient center. His letter gave another reason as well: Poggi explicitly called craft workshops and cheap shops “low trade,” which hindered a monumental and expensive center.

The city council chose a site in San Lorenzo: close enough to the center and the railway, but outside Mercato Vecchio. The densely populated Camaldoli di San Lorenzo neighborhood stood here. The houses were expropriated from their owners, the residents were rehoused, and several old streets were widened. The cleared space was taken by the main one of the three planned city food markets. This is where the word “Centrale” came from: it meant the principal market, not the geometric center of Florence.

The engineer-architect Giuseppe Mengoni received the commission to organize trade so that food could be stored and sold under one roof, with light and constant ventilation. He divided the hall with internal streets, assigned areas to different kinds of goods, and designed special counters for fishmongers, greengrocers, and sellers of flowers, lemons, and eggs. The stone arcades outside concealed structures of cast iron, iron, and glass that were modern for their time.

In May eighteen seventy-four, the pavilion was ceremonially opened with an international horticultural exhibition. Inside, palms, ferns, orchids, and pools with aquatic plants were arranged. When the exhibition was dismantled, the traders of Mercato Vecchio remained in their old places. Their income depended on the daily sale of perishable goods. The spacious hall, without the familiar flow of customers, was a poor exchange for cramped but profitable rows of stalls.

The municipality secured the relocation by decree. On November first, eighteen eighty-one, the traders of Mercato Vecchio were forbidden to trade outside the new pavilion and the designated areas around it. A few days later, a newspaper contemporary to the event reported that the move had become universal: customers followed the traders, and Mercato Vecchio was emptied. Seven years after the opening ceremony, the building finally began to perform the work for which Mengoni had designed its streets and counters.

Today’s San Lorenzo market consists of two adjacent parts. Downstairs, Mercato Centrale still sells meat, fish, bread, vegetables, and other food; the upper floor is occupied by restaurant counters and communal tables. Outside, a separate street market operates: clothing, leather goods, and souvenirs are sold on Via dell'Ariento and the neighboring streets. They share a name, but the decree of eighteen eighty-one drove food trade specifically under the iron roof.