The Bazaar – Consumption Market Hall

THE BAZAAR – CONSUMPTION MARKET HALL ARCHITECT VICTOR GERABEK The presence of the Bazaar in Buzău is recorded for the first time in 1575, as the first documentary attestation in the Buzău area of a market as an urban element. Here was the permanent market of the fair, with shops, stalls, cellars, warehouses and eating houses. It was the second bazaar in Wallachia. At the end of 19th century, the authorities of Buzău were convinced that a clean city needs utilities that respect the sanitary and veterinary measures imposed by the legislation in force. Mayor Nicu I. Constantinescu initiated, on 25th July 1896, the works for the construction of a butcher and fish market hall in Piaţa Oborului. The first project was drawn up by V. Gerabek, the city architect, based on the model of the Traian Markety Halls of Bucharest. On 29th September 1896, the contract was signed with the Italian entrepreneur Minea Giovanni for „the construction of a butcher and fisher market hall in the large market of the stockyard in this city.” Another contract was signed with the Italian entrepreneurs Tofali Govanni and Ferenza Seguna for the construction of the esplanade around the market hall. Originally named the Consumption Market Hall, it was definitively accepted by the City Hall on 5th April 1899. After the construction of the Meat and Fish Market Hall in the centre of the city (!1936), the Bazaar building kept its role as a commercial center, and in the 90s of the last century the place (the building and the esplanade) was known as Gorbachev Market, where there were hosted stands, stalls and shops of small traders, many of them from across the Prut, with small goods from the ex-Soviet space, later from Turkey and China. Currently, as part of Cuza Vodă Street Ensemble, included on the List of Historical Monuments (BZ-II-a-B-02322), the Bazaar building has been renovated and it is part of the historic centre of the city, housing the City Hall’s public utility infrastructure.