Hawa Mahal
Nine hundred and fifty-three windows and a metre of depth: a façade, with almost nothing behind.
Duration
45 min – 1 hr
Best time
At sunrise
Open
Every day
Entry price
To confirm
The Hawa Mahal was built in 1799 so that the court's women could watch the street without being seen: purdah forbade them to show themselves, and this pink sandstone façade pierced by nine hundred and fifty-three latticed windows gave them the city without the reciprocity.
It is not a palace but a wall: the building is five storeys and barely more than a metre thick in places, with no staircase — you go up by ramps. The windows create a permanent draught that cools the whole, hence the palace of the winds.
Getting there
On Hawa Mahal Road, in the old pink city. The entrance is at the back of the building, down a side lane — not through the façade.
What the price covers
paid entry from the back of the building, with a foreign rate distinct from the Indian one; the façade is free to look at from the street. Rates to be checked
Rules on site
The internal ramps are steep and without a handrail in places. The street in front of the façade is busy and has no pavement: photograph from the cafés opposite, not from the road.
