Nazla Village
Located on a branch of Bahr el-Youssef and runs through a deep clay bed In the western part of Fayoum. The river clay is used for a local handmade pottery , for many, it’s a pottery paradise. Potters of Nazla use a very particular technique to make a spherical pot based on combination of wheel-thrown and hammer-and-anvil. Work is carried out according to very old and traditional methods of producing pottery that have not changed much since Pharaonic times.
Inside the 20 workshop, there is a hole, a kind of hemispherical scoop in the ground. Straw and clay are mixed together, sometimes with ash. The material is in the hole, and it is hammered and turned at the same time to make large globes. The big pots are allowed to dry a little, and it is only then that the vessels are finished on the wheel.
There is no wheel involved, no mechanical process. Only the rims of the large round pots are made on the throwing wheel. These vessels are not a result of mechanical turning but of the turning of the body, the rhythm of the body and the hole in the ground. The pots of Nazla are archetypes, and are therefore in history. Here the history is walking alongside the vessel, on a different but parallel path.
While the Nazla pots are fired,they are fired at fairly low temperatures and the use of straw, mixed with the clay, also inhibits strength. The pots were used in the kitchen to carry and store water and milk, for animal foodstuffs, and for a whole host of purposes. But now the utilitarian aspects of the pots, these are perhaps over. They have less and less utility and there is not a big future. There is a need now to help the potters to develop the pots as forms and shapes rather than objects that are supposed to have a utilitarian value. The potters are friendly and ready to spend time showing the tricks of the trade.
Nazla Village Visitors Center:
The people of Al Nazla Village, have their own distictive way in crafting pottery. That way they inherited since thousands of years ago and still stuck in their minds, despite their contemporary suffering. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) found a very good opportunity to develop the village and focus on this interesting craft by building a visitor center to add a new value for this local place socially wise through the architectural product. Built entirely of Nazla Pottery pots by Egyptian Architect Hamdy el Setouhy, the visitor center will serve two sections of people. First, the visitors who need pottery exhibition, services and rest areas. Second, the potters who need storing areas, kitchen and working spaces.
Explore Al Nazla with Fayoumer!
As to provide the Fayoum visitors with an ultimate Fayoum experience. Explore Fayoum founder, Mahmoud a.k.a Fayoumer, a local guide and a researcher based in Fayoum Governorate will take you on curated tours to explore fabulous Fayoum in different thematic itineraries to ensure an ultimate Fayoum experience. He will share with you his knowledge of the area and his interesting Fayoum stories. More Info Here
Source: Eco-Tourism Plan, Fayoum.