Camden Markets: London tourist attraction is for sale

Ehe largest cluster of street markets in the British capital, Camden Markets are being put up for sale by the owner, an Israeli billionaire. The software entrepreneur Teddy Sagi is said to be targeting a price of around £1.3 billion (1.55 billion euros), reports the Financial Times. This would have more than doubled the amount originally invested in the six-hectare site. Sagi hired consultants from the private bank Rothschild & Co for the sale.

Camden Markets consists of a number of street markets and halls, with shops, larger chain stores, stages, restaurants and bars in Camden, North London, along the Regent’s Canal. On a good day, they attract more than half a million visitors. Since 2014, Sagi had successively bought three of the six major markets plus residential and co-working office buildings for around half a billion pounds and then invested a hundreds of millions in modernization. There were also protests against the gradual displacement of small alternative stands and handicraft stalls by large fashion chains.

Camden Markets have been a tourist attraction since the 1970s. With a lot of graffiti and brightly painted facades, second-hand shops for clothes, trendy bars and music stages, they exuded a certain hippie atmosphere. Camden Markets were once considered a center of ‘counter culture’. In the meantime, however, the rebellious spirit has largely given way to big commerce and consumption, even if there are still many small jewelry and knick-knack shops in side streets. More and more stalls with food from all over the world have replaced the craft shops.

Since it was acquired by Sagi’s company LabTech in 2014, Camden Markets has seen an increasing number of major fashion stores and leisure brands. In March, LabTech announced the construction of a new amusement center – complete with roller coaster and other rides – in a three-story building on Harley Wharf in Camden Market, which will be operated by global leisure company Babylon Park.