Ribera Market

This is Bilbao’s great market, and it stands exactly where it always has. From the 14th century, the Old Square beside San Antón was the commercial heart of the town: baserritarras, the farmers from the Basque farmhouses, came down with vegetables, eggs and cheese, and fishing boats unloaded their catch here.

1Wool for Flanders

Bilbao did not live off its market alone. From the Middle Ages, sacks of Castilian wool left the quays on this bank bound for Flanders, while cloth, spices and goods from northern Europe came in. In 1511 the Consulado de Bilbao was created, the merchants’ court that regulated river traffic and maritime insurance for centuries.

2A building from 1929

The stalls were first covered by a simple roof and then by an iron-and-glass structure that turned into an oven every summer. The present building, in reinforced concrete, opened in 1929 to a design by Pedro de Ispizua: open floors, lots of natural light and facades with an Art Deco air. The flood of August 1983 badly damaged it, and in 2009 engineers found that the concrete had been made with beach sand, full of salt, which was rusting the steel inside. It was rebuilt in phases without closing for a single day.

In 1990 it entered the Guinness Book of Records as the most complete municipal food market.

3What to look for

• The stained-glass windows on the river-facing facade.
• The crests and floral motifs on the corner towers.
• The footbridge across to the other bank, towards Bilbao la Vieja.