Isfahan

Isfahan became the Safavid capital under Shah Abbas I at the end of the sixteenth century. The new square, mosques and bazaar created an enormous demand for tilework, metalwork, textiles and painting, and many workshops still trade from the bazaar around Naqsh-e Jahan Square.

Today the city is one of the most concentrated centres of handicraft production in Iran and was named a World Crafts City by the World Crafts Council in 2015.

Many workshops welcome visitors, but working practices vary. Ask before photographing, and expect showrooms and workshops to be separate spaces.

Safavid-era building campaigns and bazaar networks provided settings for painted tile, metal, textiles and book arts. These trades remain living practices, not fixed survivals of a single era. Compare a contemporary workshop's process with the process described for a historic object, rather than assuming both are identical.

Qalamzani cuts or raises a metal surface; minakari fires glassy colour onto metal; khatam applies sliced composite rods to a support. A shop may sell all three without making all three.

Ask whether you are visiting a maker, reseller or both; request permission before photographing production, and label each object with workshop, date, material and how those facts were obtained. A landmark photograph cannot serve as a provenance record for goods sold nearby.

Observe working methods with permission; do not treat a market label, regional motif or heritage listing as evidence of the maker of an individual object.