Tuesday 23 February 2016

DESKTOP 938 - HAWA MAHAL, JAIPUR

Hawa Mahal ("Palace of Winds" or "Palace of the Breeze"), is a palace in Jaipur, India. Built of red and pink sandstone, the palace forms a part of the City Palace, and extends to the zenana, or women's chambers. It was built in 1799 by Maharaja Sawai Pratap Singh, and designed by Lal Chand Ustad in the form of the crown of Krishna, the Hindu god. Its unique five-storey exterior is also akin to the honeycomb of the beehive with its 953 small windows called jharokhas that are decorated with intricate latticework. The original intention of the lattice was to allow royal ladies to observe everyday life in the street below without being seen, since they had to observe strict "purdah" (face cover). Besides this, the lattice also provides cool air caused by the Venturi effect (doctor breeze) through the intricate pattern and thereby air conditioning the whole area during the high temperatures in summers.

This post is part of the Travel Tuesday meme,
and also part of the Ruby Tuesday meme,
and also part of the Our World Tuesday meme,
and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

3 comments:

  1. Ai so enjoyed my stay in Jaipur and the visit to the palace. But even better were the streets surrounding it with all the little shops and businesses.

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  2. Cool photo!
    Thanks for joining in at http://image-in-ing.blogspot.com/2016/02/every-10-minutes-someone-in-us-dies-of.html

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