Tokyo's Omotesando is an area where luxury brand shops and buildings designed by famous architects line up as if competing against each other. People coming and going on the streets in the area are stylish and sophisticated. These days, however, you often encounter strange scenes here in Omotesando. Under the arms of the stylish ladies strolling on the streets in stiletto heels are not expensive-looking handbags, but rather shopping bags filled with vegetables. Flanked by CHANEL and BVLGARI, you can see a signboard that reads "Farmer's Market." What's happening in the town on the cutting edge of Tokyo fashion?

"Agricultural life in the city" is the concept of "Farmer's Market @GYRE," which has been held one weekend a month in Omotesando since November 2008. It is set up in the first basement of fashion complex GYRE - home to a number of high-class boutiques - and has been arousing people's interest by selling fresh vegetables, fruits and flowers.

The market features various kinds of agricultural products, ranging from freshly harvested carrots still covered in the soil in which they were grown to eye-pleasing fruits in a rainbow of bright colors. From the young to the elderly, people of every age can enjoy shopping here. On the first floor, the pleasant sounds of a live ukulele or jazz band performance can be heard, attracting people enjoying an afternoon stroll on Omotesando Avenue.

It is not just because of the location or the building that this market has a hint of the artistic. The market is organized by Tokyo Design Flow, a project team with the mission of being an information communicator under the theme of "designs and urban culture and life through designs." The team's concept of "approach things through designs" is well reflected in the Farmer's Market.

"Food is a type of art work. We wanted to present a 'joyful space' with a well-thought out overall design including graphics and displays and even with an element of music," says Mr. Tanaka, the man in charge. "Agricultural" factors such as farming and nature will be increasingly essential elements for a mega-city like Tokyo and individuals believing in this idea encountered these factors of design and started this market.

There are about one hundred kinds of vegetables and fruits sold in the Farmer's Market @GYRE. Among them, organically grown products and strange fruits that you can't find in supermarkets are popular. Suppliers of the products and partners are chosen carefully by the project team based on the two basic criteria of "being trustworthy" and "growing delicious products." One notable aspect is that people who are selling products in the market have very unique and profound personalities, even more so than the vegetables and fruits being sold.

One group consists of young people who did not take over families' farming businesses and chose to work in Tokyo, but they sell vegetables and rice grown on their parents' farms. You will also find fruits being sold by a creative team that is engaged in producing events along with their main business of running a fruit shop. The people are unique and varied here. Those unique vendors are also good at talking with customers. One of the characteristics of Farmer's Market @GYRE that you will enjoy even more than shopping is having conversations with the vendors, which may be a "connection between people" generated via "agricultural" factors.

Holding an agricultural market in a luxury brand building and organizing performance by artists, Farmer's Market @GYRE is indeed unique and different from traditional markets. However, these are not the only notable characteristics of the market. A collaboration project is carried out between stylish cafés and restaurants on the fourth floor of GYRE on market days, where you can enjoy special menus using fresh vegetables from the basement Farmer's Market. The project has proven very popular and you will definitely enjoy the delicious taste of the ingredients, pondering how all the vegetables were grown and feeling gratitude toward their producers and vendors.

Goods are overflowing in the city and most people don't even realize how low the food self-sufficiency rate in Japan is or seriously think about the food that goes into their own mouths. Even while being in the city, however, Farmer's Market @GYRE makes one feel close to agriculture and agricultural products and provides the opportunity to seriously think about the essential action of "eating" to live, along with the nature and agriculture that support it.

Producing a life style connected to nature by taking advantage of being in the city is what "Farmer's Market @GYRE" is advocating from urban Omotesando, in order to make people realize its importance. Holding this kind of event may play an alternative  role in connecting the future of the Tokyo megalopolis to nature.