Covent Garden Flower Market

In 1835, Covent Garden Market had its beginning when a patent for a public fair or “mart” was issued. In 1845 the market found a permanent home when city business owners donated land near Richmond, King and Dundas St. Tuesday, Thursday and Saturdays were the days the farmers arrived to sell their wares. The inside main floor was strewn with sawdust and the shoppers could choose meat from many different butchers. Outside, buyers and sellers mingled, bargaining over wares ranging from boxes of trinkets and wild raspberries to kitten litters.

For many years the capital's main wholesale market for flowers, fruit and vegetables was at Covent Garden. In 1961 it was decided the need for modernisation. Construction began in 1971 south of the Thames in Battersea, on the site of the former Nine Elms Locomotive Works and Nine Elms railway station. The New Covent Garden Market opened for business on 11 November 1974.

We remember a very early start for a trip to the ‘New Convent Garden Flower Market’ as a floristry student.