Colline des Potiers (Pottery Hill)

The Colline des Potiers — Pottery Hill — is Safi's most distinctive neighbourhood, an entire hillside of kilns, workshops, showrooms, and potters' homes stretching north of the medina. The smoke rising from the wood-fired kilns and the smell of glazing chemicals in the air are unmistakeable.

You can walk into most workshops for free and watch potters shaping clay on foot-powered wheels and painting the intricate geometric patterns by hand. The showrooms above sell everything from small decorative tiles to monumental vases. Prices here are substantially lower than in Fez or Marrakech for identical quality. If you want to buy ceramics in Morocco, this is the place to do it.

things to do sight craft
A story
The distinctive blue-green glaze on Safi ceramics comes from manganese oxide and copper compounds that have been used here since at least the 14th century. Safi potters developed their own school of geometric decoration, distinct from the Fassi and Marrakchi styles, and their work was exported by Portuguese merchants across the Atlantic to Brazil and the Caribbean.