The Central Market Hall (Kozponti Vasarcsarnok), also known as the Great Market Hall (Nagycsarnok), is the largest and oldest indoor market in Budapest and one of the most distinctive pieces of nineteenth-century iron-and-glass market architecture anywhere in central Europe. The market occupies a vast hall at the Pest end of the Liberty Bridge, at the foot of the principal shopping street of Vaci utca, and is one of the most-visited buildings in the Hungarian capital, drawing both local shoppers and a steady year-round flow of visitors. The market hall was built between 1894 and 1897 to a design by the Hungarian architect Samu Pecz, as the centrepiece of a programme to modernise and centralise the food supply of the rapidly growing late-nineteenth-century city. The building is a monumental structure of steel framing and brick infill, covering around ten thousand square metres beneath a vast pitched steel-and-glass roof, with the distinctive roof clad in colourful glazed Zsolnay ceramic tiles in the Hungarian national colours. The building was badly damaged in the Second World War and again neglected under the communist period before a thorough restoration in the 1990s recovered its original splendour. The market is laid out across three levels. The vast ground floor holds the principal food market, with rows of stalls selling fresh fruit and vegetables, meat, the celebrated Hungarian paprika in every grade and colour, salami and sausage, cheeses, pickles, honey, and the strings of dried paprika and garlic that have become a signature image of the hall. The upper gallery floor holds a row of food stalls selling traditional Hungarian street food - langos, goulash, stuffed cabbage and chimney cake - alongside souvenir and craft stalls selling embroidery, lace, paprika, Tokaji wine and palinka. The basement holds a fish market, pickles and a small supermarket. The market is open Monday to Saturday, closed on Sundays, with hours running from early morning to mid-afternoon on Mondays and to early evening on the busier days. The building is one of the principal stops on the Budapest visitor circuit, both for its architecture and as a place to sample and buy traditional Hungarian food products, and the upper-gallery food stalls are a popular lunch destination.

Type: Market / Mall

Address: Vamhaz korut 1-3, Budapest, Hungary

Opening Date: 01/01/1897