The organisers thanked everyone who supported the Flea throughout its history.
The Dublin Flea Market has announced that it will cease trading permanently after Christmas.
The institution, which is located at the Digital Hub on Thomas Street, announced the news on Instagram this weekend.
In outlining their reasons for closure, the group pointed to Dublin’s skyrocketing rents which threaten the existence of cultural spaces in the country’s capital.
In a post on Instagram, the market’s organisers wrote: “After lots of difficult and emotional, discussions, we, the founders and organisers of the Dublin Flea Market, have come to the conclusion that we are not in a position to operate the Dublin Flea Market anymore. Therefore the Dublin Flea Market will officially cease operation at the end of 2021.”
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The statement continued: “This was not a decision we made easily, in fact it was not a decision we feel like we had full control over. This decision was sired by the unfortunate red tape and rocketing rents of the ever difficult Dublin City where cultural spaces are at an all time low and buildings are still being demolished to make way for more hotels and overpriced office blocks. The reality of the pandemic also played its part and the shift in focus and energy that brought many of us to exodus the constricting confines of the city walls.”
Reflecting on the history of the market, the organisers described the flea as a “focal point” for Dublin.
“We invested our hearts and so much energy into it over an amazing eleven years,” they wrote. “We hosted thousands of traders who travelled from all over Ireland and as far as the UK and France to trades with us. We also welcomed hundreds of thousands of happy market visitors from Ireland and all over the world.”
They finished with a message of thanks to everyone who has ever “visited, supported, traded, haggled, shopped, laughed, danced, hugged” at the market.
