7. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The farmers, customers, and administrators have all participated in the creation of space and place of these five farmers’ markets. The persistent and innovative farmer has been central to the continuation of the farmers market which could have died somewhere between the 1950s and the 1990s. They also contribute to the sensual and informal education that coexists with his or her commercial intent. The customer is seeking social and culinary nourishment. She is the central actor in the market who generates the central ritual of this urban social space. The farmers’ market administrator not only draws people for commercial or political reasons, but has hands in direct control of the place and its success or failure. She has made the farmers market financially viable.

The innovations of the small scale farmer not only keep the farmers’ market interesting, but contribute to the uniqueness of each farmers’ market. Through this persistence each farmer has developed techniques, favorite crops, and his own story. The small scale farmer sets up the sensual landscape that customers associate with the place of the farmers’ market. The farmer provides food and education, and is central to the theme of the farmers’ market.

The crucial demands and actions of customers contribute to the sense of place and give farmers a market for their products. Not only is there a demand for a certain types of food and social outlets, but the type of group that frequents the market becomes an attraction for other customers as well. This group of people is recognized as belonging to this space.
The administrator has the most power to create and change the place of the farmers’ market, but customers and farmers vote with their feet and their food. The administrator must balance the demands of the customer with the supply of the farmer.

Each farmers’ market is a created space and place. It is a combination of the skills and products literally brought to the table by the farmers, the economic and social activities of the customer, and the coordination of the administrators that makes it what it is. While the space is the physical boundaries of the farmers’ market, the place is made up of the cyclic actions of these three actors.

The place of the farmers’ market has its own robust power; it can continue despite difficulties. It exists partly in the minds of these three actors and partly in the physical environment. Place is recognized for its history and its connotations. The farmers’ market remains a place of memories recorded and re-recorded in the minds of those continually using it as well as that recorded and re-recorded in the design of the built environment. The place and its design are the people and the space and the activity and memories of activities past.