News from Shrewsbury Market Hall
Shrewsbury’s famous market hall celebrates its 60th anniversary this month with an exhibition taking visitors on a trip down memory lane.
The exhibition will launch on the building’s official anniversary, Tuesday 16 September, and run for a month to celebrate its history, market memories and the stories of its longest established traders.
The imposing Post Modernist building, with its iconic redbrick clock tower that can be seen for miles around, is arguably one of Shrewsbury’s most controversial buildings.
Fascinating historical videos, showing the demolition of the town’s old Victorian market and the building of the new one, will form a central part of the exhibition. Footage will also include a drone flight over the market hall and its iconic clock tower.
A series of displays will take visitors on a journey into the histories of the market’s longest running businesses – some of them more than 100 years old. There will also be a memory board of old photos and stories, taking visitors back in time.
Shrewsbury’s indoor market, jointly managed by Shropshire Council and Shrewsbury Town Council, is one of the best-known markets in the UK, having won the title of ‘Britain’s Favourite Market’ a record four times – in 2018, 2023, 2024 and 2025.
ITV News report – 8 September 2025. What is the secret to Shrewsbury indoor market’s success? (click image to watch)
Market manager Amy Williams of Shropshire Council said:
“Love or hate its 1960s architecture, our market hall has become one of the most iconic buildings of Shrewsbury – not just for its unique design and striking huge clock tower, but the fact that it houses one of the best-loved markets in the UK,”
“The exhibition will meander through the market and culminate in a fascinating video about the demolition of the old Victorian market hall and the building of the new one.”
The building was hailed 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 said to be in a poor state of repair and was condemned as unhygienic, dingy and “no longer fit for purpose”.
Even today older generations of Shrewsbury still mourn the loss of the Italianate Victorian market hall that once stood on the same site between Shoplatch, Claremont Street and Bellstone.
Although, back in the 1960s, it was the Victorian market hall that was described as “ugly” by civic leaders looking to a new age. One local newspaper dubbed the Victorian Market Hall, built in 1869, “a monstrosity”.
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”.
As well as the market, the building also includes a shopping centre at street level and former offices and student accommodation within an adjoining section of the building called Mardol House.
Traders and civic dignitaries have been invited to the exhibition’s official launch next Tuesday.
