Marin’s Parisian-style flea market offers a true French experience

Figurines from the 1960s are for sale at the Marin French Market on Sunday, June 9, 2024, in Marin, Calif. More than 100 vendors offer vintage and antique items for sale at the monthly event held in the parking lot of the Marin Civic Center. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group)

For lovers of antiques, second-hand bargains, and all things vintage in the Bay Area, there are a few well-known weekend flea markets that offer good hunting grounds. But the French Market in Marin County offers a bit of a I don’t know what with a touch of Paris — but in the United States.

The market, held on the second Sunday of each month, features vendors selling fine furniture, used home and garden items, and beautiful vintage clothing, jewelry, and collectibles. But it also tries to live up to its name by replicating a quintessentially French experience. Veteran antiques dealer Fern Loiacono of Mill Valley opened the French market in 2011, inspired by her memorable visits to the famed Saint-Ouen flea market near Paris in the 1980s and ’90s.

While most Americans visiting the French capital head to the Louvre or the Eiffel Tower, Loiacono takes the metro north to the Marché aux Puces de Paris Saint-Ouen, as it’s officially known. There, she wanders the labyrinth of alleys and alleys of the Marché du Biron or Marché Vernaison, part of the larger complex. She might stop at one of the hundreds of boutiques, booths and showrooms and browse everything from museum-quality and centuries-old furniture to secondhand books, art objects and vintage designer clothing.

Loiacono was apparently looking for early 20th-century porcelain dolls from Paris and Germany, which she collected and sold. But the street atmosphere of the world’s largest antiques market gave her plenty more to enjoy.

“There was a special atmosphere,” Loiacono said. “We would get up very early and look for whatever we could find, whether it was dolls or artwork. We always felt like we were finding a hidden treasure. There were also cafes with music, the smell of food, the people. It was such a wonderful atmosphere.”

The Marin French Market can’t offer its visitors the streets of Paris, of course. But it still operates in the leafy setting of the Marin County Civic Center campus, in a parking lot next to a scenic lagoon and the county’s Frank Lloyd Wright-designed administration building and courthouse.

The market also offers plenty of temptations for antique lovers, flea market enthusiasts and anyone who enjoys looking at beautiful things. They can browse through over 140 stalls, manned by dealers selling vintage and estate jewellery, French country furniture, Chinese tableware, delicate crystal, women’s and men’s clothing from the 1920s to the 1970s, art posters, Tiffany or Art Deco lamps, beautiful textiles and rugs, African art and even old typewriters.

To give the market that Parisian street feel, Loiacono brought in a food truck to sell sweet and savory crepes and musicians to entertain, filling the air with jazzy sounds from the 1920s and ’30s or classic French standards once sung by Edith Piaf and Yves Montand.

The quality of the vendors’ displays and the wares they sell also give the French Market the chic feel of the markets Loiacono loved to visit in Paris, according to Pam Lee, one of the market’s longtime vendors. In other words, the French Market isn’t known for selling junk, Lee said.

“Fern is discriminatory and she wants salespeople to do a presentation, like they’re doing a live show,” Lee said.

That’s not to say that people won’t find great deals. They’ll also meet dealers who are more than happy to share their extensive knowledge and passion for what they sell.

Lee, for her part, is known as the “Bakelite Lady,” because she sells colorful costume jewelry from the 1920s to the 1960s. Made of Bakelite, an ancient plastic trademarked in 1907 and widely used in manufacturing, Lee’s bracelets, bangles, and brooches have become highly sought-after. But Lee can also wax poetic about the history of the substance and how Bakelite became a popular jewelry material, favored by designers like Coco Chanel and Elsa Schiaparelli and worn by socialites and movie stars.

Robin Rawlings Wechsler, a photographer who works with Loiacono on his social media pages, admires sellers who spend their weeks visiting garage sales and estate sales, scouring thrift stores or going to auctions, all in search of “that special something.”

“These special little things contain our history, tell our stories, speak for our artists and are often so beautiful you have to hold them to believe them,” Rawlings Wechsler said recently, while sharing photos from a market tour on Facebook.

Details: The French Market is open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on the second Sunday of each month at the Marin Civic Center on Civic Center Drive in San Rafael. Admission and parking are free, and you can browse the popular Marin Sunday Farmers Market, which runs from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. across the county administration building, during the same visit. For more information, visit www.thefrenchmarketmarin.com.