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Medallion Architecture

The Medallion Architecture is a standard design pattern for modern data lakes, particularly widely adopted in platforms like Fabric and Databricks. It organizes data into three layers:

Three-Layer Structure​

1. Bronze Layer - Raw Data​

  • Stores raw, unprocessed data directly imported from source systems
  • Maintains original data format and structure
  • May contain duplicates, errors, and inconsistent data
  • Used as a reference for auditing and troubleshooting

2. Silver Layer - Cleaned Data​

  • Performs cleaning, transformation, and validation on Bronze data
  • Removes duplicates, handles missing values, standardizes formats
  • Higher data quality with more standardized structure
  • Suitable as a foundation for analysis and reporting

3. Gold Layer - Business Layer​

  • Aggregated and optimized for specific business needs
  • Contains data required for reports, dashboards, and machine learning models
  • Highly structured and easy to use
  • Oriented towards end users and applications

Advantages​

✅ Data quality improves layer by layer ✅ Clear audit trail ✅ Facilitates data governance and compliance ✅ Supports multiple use cases (analytics, ML, reporting) ✅ Easy to maintain and troubleshoot

This architecture frequently appears in Fabric exams and is a core concept in modern data engineering!