Kensington Market

National Historic Site Of Canada; A Dense Street Market Of Narrow Victorian Houses Converted To Shops, Successively Jewish, Portuguese, Caribbean, East Asian And Latin American, And The Neighbourhood That Best Explains Toronto · Toronto, Ontario

Kensington is a few blocks of narrow Victorian houses west of Spadina whose front rooms and porches were turned into shops more than a century ago, and it has been remaking itself ever since. It began as a JEWISH MARKET - immigrants from Eastern Europe selling from their own front steps, which is why the buildings look like houses rather than shopfronts - and became in turn Portuguese, Caribbean, Vietnamese, Chilean, Ethiopian and a dozen other things without ever quite replacing what came before. The result is a National Historic Site that is also a functioning neighbourhood: fishmongers, cheese shops, empanada counters, vintage clothing, a Jamaican patty window and a Portuguese bakery within a hundred metres of each other. On the last Sunday of most summer months the streets close to cars entirely for PEDESTRIAN SUNDAYS. It is scruffy, loud, entirely unpolished and the single best argument for what Toronto actually is.

Kensington Avenue and Augusta Avenue, Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

THE STREETS ARE PUBLIC AND OPEN AT ALL TIMES; INDIVIDUAL SHOPS KEEP THEIR OWN HOURS and they vary enormously. IN GENERAL the food shops open in the morning and close in the early evening, the vintage clothing shops open late morning, and the bars and restaurants run late. MANY SHOPS CLOSE ON MONDAY and some on Sunday too, so a Monday visit sees a fraction of the market. SATURDAY IS THE BUSIEST AND FULLEST DAY. PEDESTRIAN SUNDAYS - when the streets close to cars and the market fills with music and stalls - have run ON THE LAST SUNDAY OF MOST MONTHS FROM ROUGHLY MAY TO OCTOBER, but the schedule has changed between years, SO CONFIRM BEFORE PLANNING AROUND ONE. There is effectively no parking; take the 505 Dundas or 510 Spadina streetcar, or walk from Spadina station.

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