Kano
— indigo that stains the hands of seven generations.
Not only on a wall.
“One of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in West Africa, where the indigo dye pits at Kofar Mata have run since 1498. The earthen walls of the old town once ringed fourteen kilometres of Hausa Kano, and sections still stand. Kurmi Market, founded by Emir Muhammad Rumfa in the fifteenth century, still trades leather, kola, and cloth. The Sahel begins just north.
Kano, 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.
Kano is the capital of Kano State in northern Nigeria, with a metropolitan population of roughly four million. It is the centre of Hausa-Fulani culture and the historic anchor of the trans-Saharan trade routes that linked West Africa to the Mediterranean. The city sits at about 481 metres elevation on the savannah edge of the Sahel. Settlement on this site reaches back over a thousand years; the Bayajidda legend traces its founding to the seventh century, and the Kano Chronicle records a continuous ruling line from 999 CE down to the modern emirate.
The Kofar Mata dye pits, opened in 1498 under Emir Muhammad Rumfa, are the last surviving traditional indigo dyeing operation of their kind in West Africa. Cloth is steeped in fermented indigo for hours, then beaten with wooden mallets until the surface takes on a deep sheen. The walls of old Kano were raised between the eleventh and fourteenth centuries, fourteen kilometres of mud-brick rampart pierced by thirteen gates. Sections still stand, particularly near Kofar Mata and Kofar Na'isa. The Great Mosque, rebuilt several times since the fifteenth century, anchors the city's centre.
The dry harmattan season, November through February, is the best window, with cooler air and dust-softened light. Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport handles direct flights from Lagos, Abuja, and several Gulf cities. Kurmi Market, founded around 1463, still trades leather, kola nut, indigo cloth, and brass. The Gidan Makama Museum, set in a fifteenth-century palace, holds the city's best-curated historical collection. Hausa is the everyday language and English is widely understood in markets and government. Modest dress is appropriate, as Kano is a long-standing centre of Nigerian Islam.