Kashi Vishwanath Temple
— — a gold spire above the oldest living city.
Not only on a wall.
“Kashi Vishwanath stands a short walk above the ghats of Varanasi, where the Ganges turns north and pilgrims have been bathing at dawn for longer than written record. The temple is one of the twelve Jyotirlinga shrines of Shiva and the most visited of them. Its central spire and dome are plated in nearly a tonne of gold, gifted by Maharaja Ranjit Singh in 1835. The current temple was rebuilt by Ahilyabai Holkar in 1780.
Kashi Vishwanath Temple, 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.
Kashi Vishwanath sits in the old quarter of Varanasi, a few hundred metres west of the Ganges and just above Manikarnika and Dashashwamedh ghats. The temple is one of the twelve Jyotirlingas, the most sacred Shiva shrines in Hindu tradition, and the principal pilgrimage focus of the city Hindus call Kashi. The present temple was rebuilt in 1780 by Ahilyabai Holkar, queen of Indore, on the site of an older structure demolished in 1669 under Aurangzeb. The Kashi Vishwanath Corridor, inaugurated in December 2021, cleared an approach from the river to the temple's western gate.
The temple's central shikhara and dome are clad in gold — roughly 800 kilograms of it, applied as plating over copper sheets. The gift came from Maharaja Ranjit Singh of the Sikh Empire in 1835, four years before his death. The lingam in the sanctum is dark stone, set in a silver altar, and is bathed daily in Ganga water carried up from the ghats. Surrounding shrines mark the Kaal Bhairav, Annapurna, and Vishalakshi forms. The 2021 corridor uncovered older temple fragments long buried under residential additions.
The temple is open to all Hindu visitors and, since the corridor reopening, more easily reached from the riverside. Five daily aartis structure the day: Mangala at roughly 3 a.m., Bhog at 11:30 a.m., Sapta-rishi at 7 p.m., Shringar at 9 p.m., and Shayan at 10:30 p.m. The Mangala and Shringar aartis are ticketed and fill weeks ahead during Sawan and Maha Shivaratri. Phones, cameras, leather, and most bags must be left at lockers outside the gate. Footwear comes off well before the sanctum.