Trajan’s Market

Trajan’s Market was a landmark brick and concrete structure built in the heart of Rome in the early 2nd century AD. Often regarded as the world’s first shopping mall, it consisted of a well-integrated arrangement of shops, halls, corridors, and observation decks, arranged on six levels up the side of the Quirinal Hill. The building was constructed entirely of brick and concrete–and in its complete departure from the traditional architectural forms of Classical Greece and the Roman Republic, Trajan’s Market is a paradigm for a fundamentally new Imperial Roman architecture.