Izmailovsky Market
Next stop: Izmailovsky Market. Izmailovsky market is located on Izmailovsky park, a park dating back to 1951 when it the grounds belonged to Zakharian-Yuriev. The land was passed from him to the Romanov family, and then to the tsar Aleksey Mikhailovich, who began a large-scale redesign of the grounds. After falling into decline after Mikhailovich's death, the grounds became a place where Peter the Great would ultimately play war games. A massive renovation project rehabilitated the park in the 19th century.
Izmailovsky Market is the most tourist-oriented market on this tour, most of the venders selling various kinds of souvenirs and hand-crafted products. The second image pictures a market street. With no cars in the market road, shoppers linger in the streets, moving from stall to stall. The following images depict two stalls, one selling fur hats, the other Russian dolls. Both stalls represent a type of presentation that is very packed together yet organized, making the most of a space that is small and packed in with the other market vendors. The final photo depicts what looks like a bunch of separate painting vendors.
Here we can see the way the market streets replicate city streets in a Disney-like way and the way the market creates quarters or areas that that have a theme or type breakdown within the larger city context. This type of organization marks a very clear divergence from the overflowing outburst of the early 20th century Suhkarev market, and a move toward the modern SimCity. This type of SimCity is that of the modern, rather than post-modern metropolis; it is one which patrons can choose to enter or not and is marked off, its borders delineated. It's merchandise, which is largely targeted at tourists, brings into even deeper clarity the extent to which this market is not characteristic of the post-metropolis; it is decidedly separate from the local fiber of the city of Moscow, aimed at creating a specifically curated experience for people living the outside the city. Its simulacrum effect doesn't inform the lives of those living in the space of which it purports to be a part. It is a SimCity to be sure, and one that certainly blurs the line between fact and fiction (specifically in the way it represents the city to outsider). Still, it is decidedly modern. Its retains some degree of known separation from daily life, much like Disneyland. You don't just enter the gates; You go all the way from your hometown to Moscow, and then enter its gates for reason that have little to do with necessity. The SimCity is yours to enter, but you aren't forced into it and it certainly doesn't come to you.