Page 94 - Travel + Leisure India & South Asia (January 2020)

Clockwise from left:
THE MERE MENTION
OF JAIPUR CONJURES
UP IMAGES OF
MAGNIFICENT FORTS,
GRAND PALACES,
AND BUSTLING PINK
STREETS IN MY HEAD.
This may partly be due to my impressions of the city
from my first visit over five years ago. Every time
I have revisited Jaipur since, new elements have
snuck into the image like previously lost pieces of a
jigsaw puzzle. A view of the sunrise from atop the
Nahargarh Fort, the sweeping promenade along Jal
Mahal, the folk music in the corridors of Amer Fort,
the picturesque Diggi Palace, the myriad colours of
Bapu Bazaar, the hot kachoris near Raj Mandir—it’s
a mishmash of sights and sounds and smells found
nowhere else in India, or the world. The last two
visits have firmly established City Palace, Jaipur in
this forever evolving picture—and rightly so. The
palace is the heart of Jaipur, one that has been
beating since the 1720s.
I spy peacocks and pigeons tiptoeing in the
royal gardens of the City Palace. We last shot
here in 2018, with the charming Maharaja Sawai
Padmanabh Singh posing in the historic sections
of the palace. A little over a year later, the 21-year-
old king is much more at ease as he welcomes
us into his childhood home. In fact, life inside
the private section of the City Palace is more
casual than you’d imagine it to be. Guarding the
khaasa gate of the private section for 34 years
now, Rampal has been around since the time of
Sawai Bhawani Singh, the last official Maharaja of
Jaipur. With broad shoulders and a humble smile
hiding under his big moustache, he tells me that
he admires the youthful spontaneity of his new
king. In a passing conversation about the changing
times, he also regales me with tales of personalities
like the late Princess Diana and Bollywood actor
Amitabh Bachchan, who have stayed in the palace.
“I wouldn’t have met the people I have if it wasn’t
for this job,” he says, with evident pride.
90 TR AV E L+LE I S U R E IND I A & S O UTH A S I A | J A N U A R Y 20 20
A dark layer of cobalt
oxide lends the blue
in blue pottery; one can
learn the process of
block printing at the
Anokhi Musuem in
Jaipur; intricate Zari
embroidery; the history
of Jaipur’s famous
bandhani print dates
back to 4000 BC.
The City Palace is part of the walled city of Jaipur,
which includes the city’s oldest parts—Chandpole,
Surajpole, Ajmeri Gate, and Hawa Mahal. Unlike
other royal cities in the region that were built on
hilly terrain, Jaipur was established on the plains and
built according to a grid plan interpreted in the light
of Vedic architecture. The streets feature continuous
colonnades that intersect, creating large public
squares called chaupars. If you observe the markets,
stalls, residences, and temples built along the main
streets, you’ll notice similarities in their facades. All
this and more contribute to its status of a UNESCO-
recognised city. Besides succeeding in its original
vision as a commercial capital, the city has also
emerged as an architectural marvel over the years.
A striking blend of Rajasthani and Mughal
architecture, the City Palace is a complex of
courtyards, gardens, and buildings. Blending
seamlessly with the old city, the magnificent palace
was originally built by Sawai Jai Singh in the 1720s
and was enlarged and adapted over the centuries
by his successors. While the king himself planned
and built the outer walls, the grid-like urban
layout of the city and its structures are credited to
architects Vidyadhar Bhattacharya and Sir Samuel
Swinton Jacob, who were guided by the keen
architectural insight of Sawai Jai Singh himself.
Being a traditionalist with a keen eye for Western
finesse and modernisation, he employed a blend
of both the ideologies, and the two architects
skilfully incorporated a fusion of Rajput, Mughal,
and European styles. It is a well-known fact that
the City Palace doubles up as a museum and thus
allows one and all to take a tour of its grandeur on
a daily basis. In its latest offering, the palace gives
you the chance of staying in its Gudliya Suite, a
restored chamber that can be exclusively booked
on Airbnb. In turn, the royal family will direct