Fes is a very old city, dating from the eighth century CE, and a large one, with a population of over a million. It has an illustrious history and although no longer the political capital of Morocco, it is considered the country’s spiritual and cultural capital.
The hotel where we stayed in Fes, the five-star Palais Medina, was indeed a palace, and I have devoted more than the usual space to it. It was an ultra-modern establishment, with a spacious lobby, luxurious rooms, and a full range of amenities, including a vast outdoor pool and lounge area. Although in general I prefer traditional settings with lots of history, I very much enjoyed the tastefully decorated lobby with its comfortable modern couches and easy chairs as well as the modernistic paintings on the walls, most of which were apparently created by contemporary Moroccan and Arabic artists, judging from the signatures on the canvases.
The morning after we arrived in Fes, I woke up early and had some time to explore the hotel and its grounds before breakfast. After checking out the lobby and the adjoining areas, I descended the impressive marble staircase leading to the patio and pool area, which turned out to be quite vast. It also turned out to be quite empty; nobody was interested in taking a swim or lounging around in the feeble sun of that chilly November morning. But it was impressive nonetheless, with two very large swimming pools and more chaises longues, cabanas and other amenities than you could shake a palm frond at.
After enjoying a sumptuous breakfast at the hotel, we embarked upon our tour of the city. Our first stop was the main rival of the Palais Medina Hotel, the Palace of the King of Morocco. Although the political capital of Morocco is Rabat, the King maintains palaces in all the major cities and actually shows up in them from time to time, in order to assure people that he still exists. On that date, November 12, 2017, King Mohammed VI was not present in Fes, but we were nevertheless greeted by royalty, in the form of a cat who obviously regarded the palace and its grounds as his own private territory, whatever members of the inferior human species might think.
From the palace our bus took us to the Borj Sud. This is one of two forts built by the then Sultan of Morocco, Ahmad al-Mansour, in 1582, with the purpose not only of defending the city against external attack, but also – and perhaps more so – of keeping the fractious population of Fes under control. The Saadian dynasty ruling Morocco in that time was based in Marrakesh and had encountered considerable opposition in Fes, which was a notoriously unruly city (and still is). Al-Mansour had the Borj Sud built on a commanding height on the south of the city, across the valley from its counterpart, the Borj Nord, located on a promontory on the hills to the north of town. By 1582 the Moroccans had acquired experience with the use of gunpowder in the course of their wars against Portuguese colonial expansion, and the Borj fortifications exemplify the results, being modeled after Portuguese forts of the time. Indeed, the forts are thought to have been built with the labor of prisoners captured in the Battle of the Three Kings in 1578, when the Moroccans defeated a Portuguese invasion and killed the King of Portugal, Sebastian I, precipitating a dynastic crisis which led to the takeover of Portugal by the Spanish monarch Philip II.
The Borj Sud provides a wonderful view of the city of Fes, especially its historic core, the districts of Fes el-Jdid and Fes el-Bali. The former is the newer of the two and contains the Royal Palace, which we had just seen, as well as the old Jewish Quarter, known as the Mellah. The Fes el-Bali, the oldest quarter, dates from around 800 CE and was itself composed of two districts on either side of the Fez River, which eventually merged into one, and now comprise the Medina (old town). We would see it later in the day. Beyond the two old quarters stretches the modern city, the Ville Nouvelle, which mostly grew up during the twentieth century.
Descending from the height of the Borj Sud, we shortly arrived at an establishment which styled itself the Art de Poterie. We debarked into the courtyard, which provided storage for the raw clay used to make the pottery and also served as the drying yard for the tiles which constituted a large share of the firm’s output. In the drying yard we shot pictures of the clay stockpile, the soaking pool, and newly formed tiles being spread out to dry; there also we met the proprietor (or manager, I’m not sure which), who took us around the shop and explained the various processes and operations involved in turning the raw clay into finished pieces of pottery.
We first observed the process of making the zellij tiles so characteristic of Moorish architecture. It begins with shaping them from raw clay and then clipping off the ragged edges. Many complex pieces such as urns and bowls, of course, have to be turned out on a potter’s wheel, and next we watched a master potter as he spun out these items with a speed and ease which we knew to be much harder than it looks. The potter may also shape and add other constructs such as handles and spouts.
The most intriguing part of the pottery creation cycle for me was the painting and glazing. Even after having observed the artists at work, I have no clue as to how they imprint the incredibly intricate designs on the clay and then apply the colors without smearing or deviating from the pattern. It must take years of learning. I remember the proprietor complaining that it was getting harder and harder to find people with the patience and talent to perform these operations, or who would take the time to learn how.
The workshop had two kilns, of ultra-modern manufacture, which appeared to be the only hi-tech equipment in the place. Stoneware pottery of the kind made in Fes is fired at temperatures of 1200 degrees Centigrade. After firing, the finished wares are placed on shelves to cure and await transfer to the showroom, where they are displayed for sale.
Our final destination at the Art de Poterie was of course the showroom, where the number and variety of items displayed was overwhelming. There was naturally also a horde of salesmen to assist in divesting us of our hard-earned lucre, but they did not need to be aggressive because the pottery was seductive enough to arouse the lust of all but the most blasé shoppers. The prices were also relatively affordable for wares of such high quality. The only restraint preventing us from spending a fortune in the place – I wanted to abscond with about half the contents of the room – was the improbability of fragile pottery surviving the journey back to the USA in buses, trains, and airplanes. Some people succeeded in bringing their purchases home in their carry-on bags, but that was not an option for me because I had too much heavy camera equipment to lug around. There was no room for additional items in my carry-on and even if there were, the breakage risk would have been little less than in checked luggage.
Sandie and I met this challenge by making a minimal selection and having it shipped. The shop was willing to pack purchases securely and ship them anywhere in the world, though they warned us that the cost would be prohibitive. Foregoing all the other attractions – the tagine pots, beverage decanters, vases, dinnerware, etc. – we settled on four beautiful hand-painted bowls. It turned out that the cost to ship to the USA was about the same as the cost of the bowls – $60 for four. For us it was worth it. The workers in the shop packed the bowls expertly – they obviously had a lot of experience – in what was essentially an iron cage with abundant protective padding, which they put together before our very eyes. The bowls did indeed all arrive intact, and we have them in our kitchen to this day, except for one which I broke. You may of course correctly retort that it’s possible to buy Moroccan pottery online these days, at reasonable prices, but I haven’t yet seen anything on the Web quite as pleasing to my eyes as the bowls we bought at that shop in Fes.
