The 35th annual Craft Fair at Mancha Blanca has been announced, with special guests from the Canaries’ Atlantic neighbours, Madeira, the Azores and Cape Verde.
The Craft Fair is one of the main attractions during the Fiestas de Los Dolores – the most important of Lanzarote’s summer festivals. For three years, Covid restrictions had put a stop to this huge event, but the crowds were back again last year.
It is held in a large marquee located next to the church in Mancha Blanca. On your way there you’ll pass a statue of Doña Dorotea, the woman who revived pottery on Lanzarote and made the “Novios del Mojón” fertility symbols an emblem of the island.
Entering the marquee at the fair, you will immediately find yourself in front of examples of Lanzarote’s most famous traditional crafts – the pretty embroidered rosettes that decorate tables, walls, and costumes; the rough pottery made from clay from the cliffs of Famara; the palm-weaving that can create items as tough as a log basket and as fine as a delicate bonnet.
Posters featuring vintage photos of Lanzarote crafts, with a focus on natural vegetable fibres such as palm leaves, will publicise the Fair.
The fair will take place from the 10th to the 15th of September in the marquee near the church at Mancha Blanca.
See the full list of participants that will be at this year’s fair here: https://www.artesaniadelanzarote.com/35-feria-de-artesania-de-lanzarote-2024/
CRAFTS ON LANZAROTE
To discover crafts on Lanzarote, three places are indispensable. First, the Teguise Market on Sundays is home to several artisans, and you’ll find several more studios and workshops in the winding backstreets of the old town.
A trip to Haría on a Saturday morning will also reveal several local craftsmen and women selling their creations in the lovely, tree-lined central square. It’s also worth checking Haria’s Taller de Artesanía while you’re there, situated next to the town food market on C/ La Longuera.
The Monumento del Campesino not only has shops selling craftworks, but several studios and workshops where you can sign up to learn various crafts.
These are by no means the only places – the Cabildo has offered active support to artisans, and Lanzarote is the sort of place where you can bump into beauty and skill by pure accident.
