The Best Weekly Markets in the Southeast

Mar 9, 2016 • Mike Field

Article by Michael Field

PEPPER PLACE SATURDAY MARKET - BIRMINGHAM, AL

Pepper Place Saturday Market is a vibrant marketplace in Birmingham, AL that draws nearly 8,000 people and 100 vendors weekly to a fledging private development in downtown Birmingham. What is particularly noteworthy about Pepper Place Saturday Market is that the market is a placemaking and community outreach component of a large, private redevelopment project called the Pepper Place Design Complex.

Photo Credit: Pepper Place

The Pepper Place Design Complex is a unique redevelopment of seven historic warehouses, including the former Martin Biscuit Company Factory and the Dr. Pepper Syrup Plant. In all, the Sloss Real Estate Company acquired and renovated 227,000 square feet of building space that now includes a theatre, restaurants, art galleries, showroom space, retail stores, and office space that houses Birmingham’s premier design center. The complex was the first major development among what is now called the Lakeview Design District, a 36-block public-private redevelopment of a historic neighborhood centered around the former Lakeview Park (the first Alabama/Auburn football game was played in a field formerly located in Lakeview Park in 1893).

Photo Credit: Pepper Place

The Pepper Place Saturday Market was started in 2000 by Catherine Sloss Jones, president and CEO of Sloss Real Estate Company, and held in the parking lot of the Pepper Place Design Complex. The market is run by The Pepper Place Farmers Market Association, Inc. with additional support from a non-profit called Friends of Pepper Place Market. The Friends non-profit is charged with fulfilling the education and community outreach aspects of the market’s mission to connect family farmers with the larger population of Birmingham, effectively connecting rural Alabama to urban Alabama.

Photo Credit: Pepper Place

Jones’ unique vision and unwavering tenacity has helped propel Birmingham from a sleepy Sun Belt town into an emerging culinary destination, full of forward-thinking restaurants, high-quality microbreweries ,and innovative bars. Sloss has inspired a new class of homegrown Birmingham locals who are making their mark by choosing to improve their hometown instead of leaving for greener pastures.

Photo Credit: Pepper Place