Market Forces

In April Spitalfields Market is due to leave the site it has occupied for 300 years. 'We'll lose the atmosphere and the characters when we move into little blocks in warehouse accommodation on Hackney Marshes', said an old-time veteran from Williams, the greengrocer. 'There used to be market men who could hardly read or write, but ask them the price of a single orange when a box of 216 cost £1.13s. 6d and they'd know without thinking'.

Memories abound. Beside the magnificent Nicholas Hawksmoor's Christ Church, is The Market Cafe in Fournier Street, which is open from lam to 1pm, the proprietor remembers when, after the war, 'there were 600 porters'. They have long gone, but the market still bustles selling vegetables, exotic fruit and colourful flowers in buildings completed between 1885 and 1935. Some will be swept away under plans for massive redevelopment proposed by the Spitalfields Development Group, which are the subject o f a public enquiry.