Market Stalls at Boston Design Center

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Rising Tide (2015), acrylic, mixed media, and photos on canvas, 60″H × 40″W

Boston

If, like us, your idea of a perfect day consists of peering through glass-front cabinets in search of a pair of serving spoons, dive-bombing stacks of antique linens in hopes of finding a set of
hemstitched dinner napkins, or meandering through shops until you find exactly the right thing—a thing you didn’t even know you were looking for—it’s probably pretty safe to say you’re an inveterate shopper.

For those of us who fall into this demographic, the recently opened Market Stalls at Boston Design Center is a good place to while away more than just a few hours. The once to-the-trade-only building in Boston’s Innovation District has recently renovated its second floor and opened it to the public. The space, which consists of 10,000 square feet of antique stalls, showcases an eclectic mix of furniture and accessories from the seventeenth century through the twentieth.

Recently we took a busman’s holiday and visited the Market Stalls, where we uncovered objects rarefied, recycled, and restored. We swooned over a chandelier from France, a chest of drawers from England, an Irish farm table, and a porcelain vase from Japan. We considered a midcentury chair and
one from 1800.

In short, it was a perfect day.

Boston Design Center, (617) 449-5514, bostondesign.com. Open Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.–5 p.m.