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he vital cycle of a market is similar to that of a person: to be born, grow, reproduce, and die. In this article, we will not kill anyone – but we do not forget the latest victims: a remembrance for the Carme and Núria markets – nor will we theorize about the sex of La Boqueria, which they say has plenty of that in its side alleys. Today we will only focus on market expansions and declines following the reopening of the Sant Antoni market. How I love the smell of gentrification in the morning. These days I have visited Sant Antoni several times. Tamarit and Comte Borrell, pedestrianized – when will we have a Catalan version of this word? – look very good, overflowing with grandparents and children on the benches and terraces, in an image that already anticipates the success of the super-block. And the market itself is the jewel in the crown. The spectacular shell boasts repainted golden friezes, and the iron pillars still have their labels on, where one can read "La Maquinista terrestre y marítima de Barcelona," from when even metallurgy was local. Inside, everything has changed so that nothing would change: nine years later, the inner aisles are once again full of vegetables, bacon, and fresh fish, sparkling like never before under just the right LEDs, while the outer aisles house the Encants stalls, and therefore you will swim in a sea of pajamas, bras, and underwear and panties at 3 for €5. It must be said that for those of us who come from rectangular markets – Hostafrancs, El Ninot, or La Estrella: most of them, really – this cross-shaped layout of Sant Antoni or Galvany has always seemed a coquetry. And on the street, the awnings once again host the Sunday old book market, as Sant Antoni is the only market that operates seven days a week.
The underground floor has also turned out spectacular: it includes the inevitable supermarket –which helps pay for all that– and maintains the walls of the Baluard de Sant Antoni, one of the bastions of the medieval wall. A piece of the Via Augusta with the original road is also hidden, nothing, the typical relic of two thousand years of history, and everything has been paved with a kind of slippery microcement that has given rise to the neighborhood's unofficial skateboard track. Tourists are already seen fluttering around the market, buying peeled fruit and having small wines at the new stalls with a "tasting bar" –meow!–, and in fact, this remains the big unknown of the reopening: will the Sant Antoni market become Boqueria-fied or will it manage to resist without becoming touristy? In Gràcia, these days the stallholders of the Abaceria market are asking themselves other kinds of questions. Their market has been deteriorating for years, awaiting a renovation that has been postponed too many times, and a pile of stalls have closed, converted into warehouses or cemeteries for old books. The few merchants who resist already have a moving date, and it seems that after the verbena they will be dispatching at the provisional location, at the top of Passeig de Sant Joan, where they will face the years of transition before being able to return and be decked out anew. Nuri, from the centenary Peixos Blasco, worries that if the renovation lasts as long as in Sant Antoni, retirement will come before she has returned to Travessera. It's just a matter of them finding Roman remains to go from the planned 3 years to who knows how many. Of course, in Gràcia they don't suffer because the renovation will make the area more expensive: the neighborhood has been gentrified for years.
Featured images: Renovation of the Sant Antoni market, photos taken from the market's website. Author: Jordi Casañas