Ben Thanh Market

Picture a low-roofed hall in the middle of Ho Chi Minh City, four big doors opening on four sides. There is nothing behind glass in here. There are somewhere between fourteen hundred and fifteen hundred stalls actively selling, packed into more than thirteen thousand square metres. The name is familiar enough that the whole ward around it carries the same one: Bến Thành. And since late 2024, it is a monument.

A Market First, a Monument Later

Four main doors, twelve smaller ones — sixteen ways into a single floor. That sounds like architectural trivia until you pick the wrong one. The south door leads into fabric and dry goods. The north door opens on fresh flowers, fruit, fresh food and the eating section. The east door is cosmetics and confectionery. The west door is footwear, handicrafts, souvenirs. Choose wrong and you walk the entire length of the market before you reach what you came for.

This is a market, not a street, which means it has walls and a real closing time. The fresh-food and eating sections wake at first light, well before the fabric, shoe and souvenir sections. Arrive late and you do not find a street still lit up — you find locked doors. But the evening here does not switch off, it moves outdoors: a night market sets up on the two flanking streets, Phan Bội Châu and Phan Chu Trinh, with the stalls put up by the market's own management board. One market, two spaces. Come at night looking for a way into the nhà lồng — the covered hall — and you will very likely miss it.

The building has stood here since 1912–1914, yet only in late 2024 was it listed as a city-level architectural and artistic monument: more than a hundred and ten years of being a market before anyone called it heritage. The first thing that status did was turn a coat of paint into something you have to ask permission for — repainting must be approved by the managing body, and the lines and motifs must be kept intact. A refurbishment in early 2026, timed to land before Tết Bính Ngọ, the lunar new year, showed exactly where that line falls. The body of the market had to be painted to match its existing state, and in early 2026 the new look was being reconsidered; the sponsoring company admitted it could not establish the roof's original colour and so went with the current state and with the roofs of buildings of the same era along Lê Lợi street. Do you already carry a colour for this place in your head? In a quick poll after the repainting, 65 per cent of more than seven thousand six hundred respondents said the new colour left them deflated, because it did not match the one they remembered.

Enough to decide whether to go

What this is

A working market that is also a city-level architectural and artistic monument

Where

South door onto Lê Lợi street, Bến Thành ward, Ho Chi Minh City

Which door

4 main doors and 12 smaller ones, each side leading into a different kind of goods

When to come

Early morning for the fresh-food and eating sections; once the hall closes, the night market opens outdoors