Kapurthala is a small Punjabi city with an outsized architectural legacy. Maharaja Jagatjit Singh, who ruled from 1877 to 1949 and made repeated pilgrimages to France, was determined to turn his capital into a "Paris of the East" — and the results are scattered around town like exhibits in a very large open-air museum. The Jagatjit Palace, modelled on Versailles and designed by French architects, sets the tone. The Moorish Mosque — designed by another Frenchman to look like a Moroccan mosque, funded by a Sikh maharaja for his Muslim subjects — is the most remarkable single building. The Panch Mandir provides a Hindu counterpoint to the otherwise Franco-Moorish streetscape.
Walking through Kapurthala feels like flipping through an architectural scrapbook: French Baroque facades next to Sikh gurdwaras next to Mughal-inspired gardens next to Andalusian tilework. The city sits about 20 kilometres from Jalandhar, making it an easy half-day trip. Come for the extraordinary architectural juxtapositions and the unhurried pace of a town that once punched well above its weight.