Dumas Beach
— — a beach the colour of cooled iron.
Not only on a wall.
“Dumas is the black-sand stretch where Surat goes to walk after work. The sand is dark because the Tapti carries volcanic minerals down from the Deccan and the tide spreads them along the bay. Vendors line the promenade with bhajiya and pav. At dusk the sea reads pewter and the sand reads almost the same colour. From the studio.
Dumas Beach, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Dumas is a coastal village and urban beach in Surat district, Gujarat, on the Arabian Sea about 21 kilometres south-west of central Surat. It sits at the mouth of the Tapti River, where the river's sediment meets the tidal flats of the Gulf of Khambhat. The beach falls within Choryasi taluka and is now effectively a weekend extension of the city. The Surat Municipal Corporation has been developing the seafront as part of its long-term Dumas tourism plan, with promenades, food courts and a proposed sea-link out to Hazira.
Dumas is one of the small handful of Indian beaches whose sand is consistently dark, sometimes called black sand, sometimes pewter. The colour comes from heavy mineral grains—magnetite, ilmenite and other iron-rich material—washed down the Tapti from basaltic uplands in the Deccan and deposited along the tidal flats. The contrast is sharpest at low tide and after monsoon, when the surface dries to a uniform charcoal and the foam on the breakers stands out white against it. The Arabian Sea here is rarely turquoise; it reads pewter most days.
Dumas is open daily and free to enter. Most visitors come from Surat by car or auto-rickshaw on the 21-kilometre Dumas Road; city buses run from Adajan and the railway station. The seafront has a paved walking promenade, camel rides, and a long line of stalls famous for pav bhaji, ragda patties and besan bhajiya. Local lore calls the beach haunted because an older cremation ground once stood near the dunes; the Dariya Ganesh temple at the south end is the present-day reason most pilgrims come down. Avoid swimming—currents and tide range are strong.