Free Market

This thesis project is a critical take on how the transformation of retail culture and consumerism has shaped cultural and social relations in Tallinn, Estonia.  After gaining independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, many traditional markets have vanished, gone through a significant process of modernization, or more often, replaced with supermarkets and grocery stores.  To keep a diversity of urban space, increase integration, and to promote the growth of small enterprises in Tallinn, this project proposes an alternative method of preserving market culture through the relocation of the last traditional market to a new site at the heart of the city.

Fading market culture 

This thesis project is a critique of a supermarket culture replacing informal market culture in Tallinn, Estonia.  The markets have occupied the squares, parks, and gray areas surrounding railways stations within Estonian cities for centuries.  Recently, there has been a growing sense of discontent and concern with the endangerment of traditional market culture and the rapid closure of traditional markets in Tallinn.  Within my thesis project, I will explore the spatial challenges created by societal change and propose an alternative for the fading market culture that could create new narratives in our urban space.