Nairobi City Market

Nairobi City Market is a covered market on Muindi Mbingu Street in the central business district, built in the early 1930s to replace the earlier Jevanjee Market. The building is an Art Deco structure with vaulted ceilings, a cream exterior intended to reflect sunlight and reduce heat inside, and courtyards designed to assist air circulation; it was gazetted as a national monument in 2009. The interior divides into sections for butchery, fresh fish and flowers, and a crafts area selling beadwork, basketry, Kisii soapstone carvings and wooden items, with stalls serving nyama choma and other cooked food. The crafts section, which extends towards Koinange Street, is used mainly by foreign visitors, while the food and flower sections serve city residents. Around 276 traders hold stalls and the market receives an estimated 20,000 visitors a month. Bargaining over craft prices is customary, and first quotes are typically well above the expected settling price.