The surprisingly colorful history of Budapest’s Great Market Hall

Vámház Boulevard and the SzikszayBefore embarking on a time-transcending journey around the area of the Great Market Hall – or, as locals once called it, “the hall” – it’s worthwhile to take a detour and look into how the street it is located on, Vámház Boulevard, got its name (which means “customs house”). Few people know it, but this boulevard had many different names during different eras. The frequent change of street signs there caused both smiles and anger, and locals even called the street, with a lot of irony, Gróf-Fürdő-Attila Street, referring to all of its previous names (Gróf Tisza István Street, Fürdő Street, and József Attila Street).

The original name of Vámház Boulevard is rather interesting – it was named “Butcher Street” in the 18th century because there were numerous meat markets in the area. It first received its current name in 1875, after the Fővámház (“Main Customs House”) – now the flagship building of Corvinus University – designed by revered Magyar architect Miklós Ybl, best known for Budapest’s Opera House. In these times there were many inns around here, and one of the most popular of these was the legendary Szikszay, located in the courtyard of the building at 16 Vámház Boulevard.Why was the market hall built here?But before we continue to introduce the atmosphere of the area, here’s a short history of the Great Market Hall. Due to the growing population and the declining public safety at the end of the 19th century, the open-air markets became less popular, so, following Western European examples, the system of covered market halls was established in Budapest. For this reason, in 1897 the city inaugurated the Great Market Hall – designed by Samu Petz, the building is covered with colorful Zsolnay tiles in a zigzagging pattern, and has a wrought-iron structure.

An interesting detail about the building is that in the beginning, a short railway connected it with the Danube bank – fresh produce was transported along it daily. Since 1977, the Great Market Hall is a listed building, and its renovation in 1999 earned the FIABCI Prix d’Excellence award, one of the most prestigious architectural recognitions, which, coincidentally, was recently won by Ferencváros, the district that is home to the Great Market Hall. The building is still constantly recommended by different foreign travel guidebooks, and CNN chose it as the best market of the world. The traders and delivery people of the area used to visit many different places around the neighborhood – now their modern-day successors can drop by Jópipa, Csarnok, or Trapéz.

Before lángos 

Immediately after its opening, the hall functioned as a food outlet and a retail hub, and although it’s hard to imagine this now, back then there was only one restaurant in the Great Market Hall. Lángos fried-dough with sour cream and cheese wasn’t offered here back then; at that point they used the basement for storage, while upstairs they mostly sold household goods, haberdashery, and flowers.

The kitchen of the single restaurant that operated here back then was famously great – which is not a surprise, as the management had access to the freshest ingredients in town. In addition, the restaurant was popular because hungry people were able to get their fix of stew here earlier than anywhere else due to the opening hours of the market. It is said that the owner tried to establish some specialties, but this didn’t really work out, because even in the so-called “white tableware” section, guests insisted on using their own pocket knives. Maybe it’s not that hard to imagine this surreal picture if we turn our attention to drinking.The Nádor – the regulars’ favorite

So where did the vendors and the regulars of the market go when they became thirsty? The Hotel NádorInn operated at the corner of Váci Street and Vámház Boulevard in a – still standing – Classicist building, housing a bath and also a café. This hotel should not be confused with another institution that used to be only a few streets away and went by the name Vendégfogadó a Nádorhoz (“Inn of the Nádor”), where politicians were regulars; traders and vendors visited the Hotel Nádor, and the establishment even opened at dawn to accommodate their early-rising clientele. This wasn’t only the meeting place of the vendors from across the street, but often guests of the nearby cafés and pubs came here to continue drinking after the other places closed. However, it was an elegant place, thus it’s easy to imagine what an amazing sight it must have been to see the combination of dress-coated gentlemen and ladies drinking their champagne or coffee among the vendors enjoying a drink, and the gents enjoying an “after party”.A poultry yard in the middle of downtown

The neighborhood of the Great Market Hall had other surprises in store. Hungarian writer Antal Szerb stated in his piece called Budapesti útikalauz Marslakók számára (Guidebook to Budapest for Martians) that if you passed the square behind the hall, hens on the left and right would all wake up, and hundreds and thousands of hens would start to make a ruckus. Why would there be hens in the downtown Budapest? It may sound as a joke, but it’s true: there was once a separated poultry yard at the back of the Great Market Hall, and vendors sold the fresh eggs and meat only a few steps away from there.Snail stew and rum

The famous Matróz Csárda (“Sailor Inn”) stood in front of Corvinus University (back then, during Hungary’s communist era, it was the Karl Marx University of Economics), at Pest’s lower embankment. When the water level was high, it was only accessible by crossing planks. There might have been multiple reasons for this to be a crowd favorite: their fish soup and their carp were famous, but they also served meals that evoked fine-dining restaurants – for example, they had frog legs and snail stew. Just like the Tabán (the now-demolished downtown of Pest around modern-day Március 15 Square), this neighborhood won’t ever has the same bustling atmosphere again – with vendors, sailors, and gents out for a night – but at least a few nice memories of the past remain here in forms of beautiful buildings, a few restaurants, and cozy pubs.