A small desert town,
painted from wall to wall
Mandawa was founded in 1755 as a fortified trading town in the Shekhawati region — a part of Rajasthan whose merchant families, having grown wealthy on the old caravan trade routes, competed with one another by commissioning increasingly elaborate frescoes on the exterior walls of their havelis.
The result, across Mandawa and the wider Shekhawati region, has been called the world's largest open-air art gallery — hundreds of painted facades depicting religious scenes, royal processions, and (in a charmingly anachronistic touch from the early 20th century) trains, cars, and even early aeroplanes, painted by artists who had only heard such things described.
Tourism here is unhurried and intimate compared to Rajasthan's bigger cities — Mandawa Fort itself is now a heritage hotel, and a walk through the town's lanes, camera in hand, remains the simplest and most rewarding way to experience it.
