The word and the idea
The word: haveli came into Indian languages through Persian, and is usually traced to an Arabic word for an enclosed, private space. That is exactly what a haveli is.
The idea: a house that turns its back on the street and its face to its own courtyard. Privacy, shade and family come first.
- Word
- Haveli, an enclosed house
- Built from
- Roughly the sixteenth century onwards
- Golden age
- Eighteenth to early twentieth centuries
- Owners
- Merchants, bankers, ministers, nobles
- Smaller cousin
- The village house around a yard
- Who built them: the merchant families of the desert towns, the bankers who financed kings, ministers of the royal courts and the nobles who kept townhouses near the palace.
- How big: some are modest homes for one household. Others have several courtyards, a hundred rooms and housed four generations at once.
- Not a palace: a palace belonged to a ruler and held a court. A haveli belonged to a family, however rich, and held a household.
- Not only Rajasthan: havelis stand in Old Delhi, Gujarat and Punjab too. But Rajasthan built the grandest, the most carved and the most painted.
How a haveli works, room by room
The pol, the great door
What it is: a tall wooden gate, often studded with iron and wide enough once for a horse or a palanquin.
- The small door: a little wicket door is cut into the big one, so people step in one at a time and the great gate stays shut.
- Look up: the doorway is often the most decorated part of the street front, with carved brackets, a painted Ganesh and a small balcony above.
The baithak, the men's reception
Where: near the entrance, around the first courtyard.
- What happened here: the men of the family met visitors, did business, settled disputes and smoked the hookah. Strangers never went further.
- What to notice: the best paintings, mirror work or carving are often here, because this was the room guests saw.
The chowk, the courtyard
What it is: the open square at the heart of the house, sometimes with a smaller second or third chowk behind.
- Why it matters: it brings light and air into every room, gives children a safe place to play and lets the house breathe at night.
- Daily life: grain drying in the sun, women chatting over vegetables, a cot pulled into the shade. The chowk was the family's living room.
The zenana, the women's quarters
Where: deeper inside, around an inner courtyard, away from the street and the men's rooms.
- What it held: kitchens, storerooms, bedrooms and nurseries. Most of the household's life happened here.
- The screens: stone lattices and small balcony windows let the women watch the courtyard and the street without being seen.
The tibari and the verandahs
- What it is: a pillared verandah, often with three arches, opening onto the courtyard.
- Why: a shaded place to sit through the afternoon, half indoors and half out.
The roof
- Summer nights: before electric fans, whole families carried their cots up to the roof to sleep in the cool desert air.
- Festivals: kites in January, lamps at Diwali and long evening conversations all year. In Jaipur the roof is still where the family meets.
The rooms below and behind
The tanka: in desert towns, an underground tank caught rainwater from the roof and courtyard for the dry months.
- The tehkhana: a cool basement used in the hottest weeks of summer, or to keep valuables safe.
- The shrine: a small prayer room or niche, often facing east, with the family's gods.
Built for the desert: why havelis stay cool
Thick walls: stone or brick walls up to a metre thick soak up heat by day and release it slowly at night, so rooms stay even.
Small windows outside: few, small openings on the street side keep out the glare and the dust.
- The courtyard draws air: as the open court heats, warm air rises and draws cooler air through the shaded rooms around it.
- Deep eaves: the chhajja, a stone eave projecting over windows and verandahs, throws shade on the walls below.
- Stone lattice: a jali screen cuts the sun, keeps privacy and lets the breeze through. Our architecture guide explains how.
- Lime plaster: burnished araish plaster on the walls stays cool to the touch and takes painting beautifully.
- Tight lanes: havelis are built close together in narrow lanes, so they shade one another. The whole old town works as one cool block.
Life inside a haveli, then and now
Our grandmother remembered the courtyard best. Grain was cleaned there in the mornings, weddings were held there at night, and a neem tree threw shade over the well. When someone fell ill, the whole house knew within the hour. She used to say a haveli had no secrets, only doors.
The joint family: brothers, their wives, children and grandparents lived together, each household with its rooms around the shared courtyard.
- The daily rhythm: women rose first to light the kitchen fires, men left for the shop or the court, and the afternoon was for rest in the shaded rooms.
- The seasons: cots moved to the roof in May and June, quilts came out in December, and the courtyard was swept and painted for Diwali.
- Celebrations: weddings, births and festivals filled the chowk with relatives, cooks and musicians for days.
- Today: many families have moved to modern houses or abroad. Havelis are divided between cousins, rented out, turned into hotels or left in the care of a watchman.
- Still lived in: walk the lanes of Jaipur, Jodhpur or Bundi and you will still see families on the steps, children on the roof and washing in the courtyard.
Jaisalmer: stone carved like lace
- Stone
- Yellow Jaisalmer sandstone
- Famous for
- Carved facades and balconies
- Patwon ki Haveli
- Begun 1805, five houses
- Salim Singh ki Haveli
- Probably around 1815
- Best hour
- Early morning, before the lanes fill
Patwon ki Haveli
- The story: a cluster of five houses begun in 1805 by Guman Chand Patwa, a trader in brocade and gold and silver thread, one for each of his sons.
- What to see: the finest carved facades in the city, and painted, mirrored rooms in the parts now kept as museums.
Salim Singh ki Haveli
- The story: the mansion of Salim Singh, the powerful and much-feared prime minister of Jaisalmer in the early nineteenth century.
- What to see: plain lower floors rising to a top storey, the Moti Mahal, that flares out in carved balconies under curved roofs.
Nathmal ki Haveli
- The story: a later nineteenth-century haveli built for another prime minister of the state, with carved elephants guarding the door.
- What to notice: the two halves of the facade are similar but not identical. Guides say two brothers carved one side each.
Shekhawati: the painted havelis
Who built them: Marwari trading families from towns such as Mandawa, Nawalgarh, Fatehpur, Ramgarh and Churu, many of whom made their fortunes in Calcutta, Bombay and beyond.
The painting peak: roughly 1830 to 1930, when merchants competed to cover their havelis inside and out with frescoes.
- What they painted: gods and epics, Krishna and the milkmaids, local heroes, and later trains, cars, gramophones and British officers. The walls are a diary of a changing world.
- Why they stand empty: many families moved to the big cities and left caretakers behind. Some havelis are restored, many are fading.
- Where to begin: the Podar and Morarka haveli museums in Nawalgarh, and the Haveli Nadine Le Prince in Fatehpur, restored by a French artist.
- Learn more: our page on painted havelis and the painted towns of Shekhawati journey go deeper.
Bikaner, Jaipur, Bundi and Udaipur
Bikaner's red sandstone havelis
- What to see: the Rampuria havelis of the old city, built in rich red sandstone with carved facades, by a family of merchants.
- Where to stay: Bhanwar Niwas, a Rampuria haveli now a hotel, is the best way to see one from inside.
Jaipur's walled-city havelis
- What to see: pink-washed facades with small balconies along the bazaars, many with shops below and families living above.
- Where to stay: Samode Haveli, the townhouse of the Rawals of Samode, with painted rooms, inside the walls.
Bundi's blue lanes
- What to see: small havelis climbing the hill below the palace, many painted blue, some with murals in the Bundi style.
- Where to stay: a few heritage havelis inside the old town. Our Bundi heritage havelis page has the details.
Bagore ki Haveli, Udaipur
- The story: an eighteenth-century mansion on Gangaur Ghat, built by Amar Chand Badwa, prime minister of Mewar, with more than a hundred rooms around several courtyards.
- Today: a museum with an evening folk dance show by the lake.
The craftsmen who made them
Stone carvers: in Jaisalmer, families of stone carvers known locally as silawats carved the facades in place, block by block, often over many years.
Masons and painters: in Shekhawati, local masons and painters built the walls and painted them, working fresco onto wet lime plaster.
- Carpenters: the great doors, window shutters and ceilings were made by carpenters who also built carts and temple chariots.
- Plasterers: araish plaster was polished by hand, sometimes for days, until it shone like marble.
- Their descendants: many of the same communities still work today, restoring old havelis and building new homes in the old style. Our page on artisans we work with tells their story.
Haveli temples and haveli music
Why a house: in the Pushtimarg tradition, Krishna is loved as a child living at home. His temple is built and run like a family haveli.
What it feels like: courtyards, kitchens, storerooms and an inner room where the image is shown at set times of day, as a child is woken, fed and put to rest.
- Haveli sangeet: the devotional music sung in these temples is known as haveli music, an old classical style sung through the day.
- Where to see it: Nathdwara, near Udaipur, is the great centre. Our page on pichwai painting explains the painted cloths hung behind the image.
- Etiquette: shoes off, phones away, and follow the crowd at darshan. Photography is not allowed inside.
What to look for when you visit
The jharokhas: small projecting balcony windows on brackets, often with their own curved roof. Our journal on what a jharokha is explains them.
The brackets: carved stone or wooden supports under every balcony, shaped as lotus buds, peacocks or elephants.
- The ceilings: painted or mirrored ceilings in the best rooms, sometimes with a hook in the middle for a fan pulled by a servant.
- The niches: small arched recesses in the walls for lamps, books and household gods.
- The door frames: carved stone or wood, often with a small Ganesh over the lintel for luck.
- The name plates: in Shekhawati, look for painted dates and the names of the families who built the house.
- The wear: smooth hollows in stone steps, worn by two centuries of bare feet, say more about a house than any plaque.
Visiting a lived-in haveli
Ask before you step in: an open door is not always an invitation. Your guide will ask the family or the caretaker.
Mind the shrine: take your shoes off near the family's prayer room and in any inner rooms.
- Ask first
- Before entering or photographing
- Shoes
- Off at the inner rooms and shrines
- Tip
- A small one for the caretaker
- Best with
- A local guide who knows the family
- Dress modestly: covered shoulders and knees are polite in any family home.
- Do not touch the paintings: old frescoes are fragile, and skin oils damage them.
- Accept the chai: if you are offered tea, a few sips is the polite answer, and it often leads to the best stories.
Staying in a haveli
What you gain: you live inside the old town, not outside it. Bazaars, temples and the morning chai are at your door.
Who runs them: many are still run by the families who own them, and the welcome is personal.
- Feel
- Intimate, family-run, full of character
- Usually missing
- Large pools, lifts, big spas
- Rooms
- Each different, some small
- Nights we suggest
- One or two, paired with a palace
- What to expect: steep stairs, rooms of every shape and size, and fewer facilities than a palace hotel. Character over consistency.
- Ask for: a room on the courtyard for atmosphere, or on the upper floors for light and views.
- Pair it: we often mix one or two haveli nights with a palace or a desert camp. Our heritage havelis guide and heritage havelis trail show how.
Who will love havelis
Lovers of detail: if you like reading a building slowly, Shekhawati and Jaisalmer will keep you happy for days.
- Photographers: courtyards, painted walls and carved balconies in low morning light are endlessly rewarding. See our page on Rajasthan for photographers.
- Families: children love the rooftops and the hidden stairs, though steep steps need watching.
- Who might not: if you need lifts, large bathrooms and a big pool, choose a palace hotel and visit havelis by day.