Stroud Farmers’ Market is celebrating its 10th birthday with a vibrant new look.

The monthly experiment that was launched with help from fashion designer Jasper Conran and the late style icon Isabella Blow in July 1999 has turned into a weekly date in the social calendar for thousands of shoppers.

It has also helped to breath new life into the fortunes of dozens of local food and drink producers.

Today, a limited edition series of market anniversary postcards and shopping bags will be available to the first few hundred customers.

New banners proclaiming all that’s good about the market adorned Cornhill, ahead of a cake cutting ceremony by Guardianfood critic Matthew Fort and civic leaders.

The market was launched on a monthly basis after a suggestion from Stroud District Council and then went fortnightly after only six months. In August 2006 it became a weekly fixture.

Organiser Clare Gerbrands, 45, who also runs the Made in Stroud shop in Kendrick Street, said: “I never imagined it would capture people’s imaginations the way it has.

“The council asked us to run it and include local farmers. We now regularly attract 50 or more stallholders, all selling their own homegrown and homemade produce.

“Thousands of customers flock to the market every week and it is now the biggest farmers’ market in the South West, bringing much trade into the town centre and contributing to Stroud’s renaissance as a successful market town, even in difficult economic times.”

The market was originally funded by grants from the district and town councils but now pays its own way. It is one of only a few outside London to run weekly and independently.

The new banners, postcards and bags were designed by artist and illustrator Simon Watkins and Clare.