Shepherd Market

Shepherd Market sits on the exact ground where a boisterous annual event called the May Fair once drew huge crowds to trade cattle and watch boxing matches. The reputation of the fair became so chaotic and unruly that it was eventually banned in the early eighteenth century. To transform the site, local architect Edward Shepherd developed this intimate square between seventeen thirty-five and seventeen forty-six. He replaced the noisy fields with paved alleys, a duck pond, and a two-story market building that housed a theater. The neighborhood around it took its name from that original, long-gone fair.