A small market open Tuesday to Saturday in a beautiful hall at 39, rue de Bretagne in the 3rd arrondissement. People come here for lunch as much as for shopping. It is the oldest market in Paris and it takes its name from an orphanage, established in the sixteenth century, who collected the lost children and wore red. Especially the Japanese cookshop and the Cous-Cous are worth going there.
I go to the flea market in St Ouen to look for old cameras and expired film. But it’s also a great place to see all the different walks of life from Paris’ extreme social scene. At the top of the ladder you’ve got the aristo-bourgeois crowd acquiring Louis XV furniture at the indoor antiques markets; the thirty-something bobo set paying way over the odds for mid-century designer chairs and formica tables; the banlieusards from the Neuf Trois getting kitted out with the latest sneakers and hoodies along the rue des Rosières; then at the very bottom you’ve got people trying to scratch a living selling second hand food at the Carré des biffes at Porte Montmartre. It’s an eye opener for sure.