Jaipur: Shopping Tour with Blue Poetry & Printing Workshop

Two Jaipur crafts, made by you, plus the markets.

Blue pottery is Jaipur's own and it is unusual: it contains no clay at all. The body is quartz powder, powdered glass, fuller's earth and gum, and it is fired only once at a low temperature. The cobalt blue came from Persia via the Mughals, and the craft nearly died out in the twentieth century before being deliberately revived. In the workshop you shape and paint a piece yourself.

Block printing is the other: a design carved in reverse into a teak block, dipped in dye, struck onto cotton by hand, and repeated across the cloth with the alignment judged by eye. Four colours means four blocks in sequence. Your first strikes will be crooked, which is the point.

Around the workshops, the markets: Johari Bazaar for jewellery, Bapu Bazaar for textiles and juttis, and the lanes of the old city. Your guide knows which shops sell hand block work and which sell screen prints at hand-printed prices — that single distinction is worth the tour.

Options

Two at checkout: by private tuk-tuk, which gets further into the old city lanes, or by private car, which is better in summer and rain.

Included

Hotel or airport pickup and drop-off, private transport with driver, professional tour guide, the workshops, bottled water, tolls and parking.

Worth knowing

Who it suits

Travellers who would rather make something than buy it, shoppers who want an honest guide, and anyone with an afternoon between forts.