The covered Pak Shuka market on Mashtots Avenue is the city's oldest enclosed produce market, a 1952 building with an ornately carved tufa portal — vines, pomegranates, harvest scenes — that is one of the more delightful Soviet-era facades in town. The market itself was hollowed out and turned into a supermarket in the 2010s, much to local protest, but the portal survives.
Mashtots Park, the small green strip running alongside, is a lively short cut between the Opera district and the Saint Sarkis Cathedral, with benches, a permanent chess corner, and several outdoor cafes.