Market Place

Analysis of historic City centre maps reveals that, prior to the construction of Leazes Road, all the principal streets leading into the City centre met at the Market Place.  Consequently, it is this space that located the heart of Durham and confirmed arrival at the centre of the City.  This perception has been significantly weakened by the severance between the Market Place and Claypath, caused by the construction of Leazes Road, but it still remains the most important space in the day-to-day life of the City centre.

However, the uses to which it is put belie this importance.  It is a service yard for adjoining shops; it is cluttered with street furniture including randomly located seats, planters and signposts; it has a poorly-conceived hard landscape layout that frustrates its potential and obscures the fundamental clarity of the space; and as a result of all of these it is poorly suited to its primary function as the City’s main social space and location for all its major events. 

As Thomas Sharpe noted in 1944, ‘while no single building in the Market Place has any special architectural distinction, the whole has a sturdy character that is well worth maintaining.  Some regrettable chain-store architecture has in recent years blotted the northern side, and measures should if possible be taken to render this less vulgar and obtrusive….’ This remains as true today as it did then.

Public realm improvements should concentrate on re-establishing a structure that reflects the clarity of the built form.  This should be achieved by a return to the simple layout illustrated in pre-war photographs where the kerb line is defined by a shallow stone channel or ‘upstand’ that echoes the building line and defines pedestrian space, with the entire central area re-paved with either evenly laid, flat-topped granite setts or the existing York stone, where this can be reclaimed, in a single uniform sweep.  The two statues may be retained as foci, but otherwise the proposed layout would rely entirely upon the use of high quality natural stone laid traditionally and simply. 

Such a treatment will free up the space visually and allow it to be used fully as an outdoor market space, the utility of which can be considerably enhanced by the incorporation of discretely designed power points in strategic locations, obviating the need for ugly and noisy power generating equipment on market days.  Other technological improvements – such as the addition of WiFi communications – should also be incorporated.

Seating should be provided, but this should not necessarily be in the form of free standing ‘off the peg’ furniture.  A subtler, more integrated approach would be to introduce substantial stone seating blocks that appear to rise out of the adjoining stone paving, achieving a simple, robust, timeless and integrated design.  These should be located to the perimeter of the space preserving the central area as an unhindered event space.

Similarly, simple lighting of the space should be achieved without the use of free standing pastiche traditional fittings that detract from the image of the space and its authenticity, and create unnecessary visual clutter.  Bespoke lighting designs, or fittings that are attached to the surrounding buildings, could be utilised.

Market Place is now the subject of an international design competition, and the necessary documentation for entry is available here.