Four generations at the lathe
How a Moradabad family turns a brass disc into a kalash over three days.
Iqbal Hussain's grandfather set up the first lathe in this workshop in 1954. The belt still runs off the same overhead shaft.
A kalash begins as a flat brass disc. It is annealed, then raised over a stake with a wooden mallet — several hundred blows working outward in a spiral, then annealed again when the metal hardens. This repeats for three days until the form is closed and the walls are even.
Only then does it go on the lathe, where the beaded rim is turned and the surface planished. Nothing about this can be hurried; a machine-spun kalash is done in eleven minutes and you can hear the difference when you tap it.
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Written at our Bengaluru studio, in collaboration with the artisan families and temple priests we have worked with for years.
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