Veerabhadra Temple
— — the pillar that doesn't quite touch the floor.
Not only on a wall.
“A granite Vijayanagara temple raised around 1530 on the low hill of Kurma Saila, named for its tortoise shape. Inside the natya mandapa, seventy carved pillars hold the roof; one of them rests a hair above the stone, and the guides pass a cloth beneath it. On the ceiling above, the largest surviving Vijayanagara mural in India keeps its colour against the dry Anantapur light.
Veerabhadra 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.
The Veerabhadra Temple sits on a low granite hill called Kurma Saila — tortoise rock — in the village of Lepakshi, in Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh, about 120 kilometres north of Bengaluru. It was built in 1530 under the Vijayanagara emperor Achyuta Deva Raya, traditionally by the brothers Viranna and Virupanna, governors of the region. The temple is dedicated to Veerabhadra, a fierce aspect of Shiva. A separate monolithic Nandi, the largest in India at roughly 8.23 metres long and 4.5 metres tall, sits about 200 metres from the main gateway, carved from a single granite boulder and facing the inner shrine.
The temple is cut from the same hard grey granite as the hill it stands on, in the late Vijayanagara style — low compound, pillared mandapa, narrow garbhagriha. The famous hanging pillar in the natya mandapa is the most-told story: one of the seventy granite pillars rests a hair above the floor, and visitors slip a cloth or a sheet of paper beneath it. The ceiling above carries the largest surviving Vijayanagara fresco in India, more than seven metres across, painted in vegetable pigments on a lime-plaster ground. The unfinished kalyana mandapa, with its half-carved wedding scene, sits in the open court behind.
Entry to the temple is free, and the gates open daily from around 06:00 to 18:00. A small fee is charged for the on-site museum. Lepakshi is reached most easily by car from Bengaluru along NH-44, a drive of about two and a half hours; the nearest railway stations are Hindupur (15 km) and the regional hub Anantapur (80 km). Most visitors spend an hour and a half at the main temple, then walk the 200 metres to the monolithic Nandi. Avoid the middle of the day from March through May, when the granite floor of the open court reads 45°C in the sun.