Guaitil Pottery

Guaitil is a small village on the Nicoya Peninsula where families descended from the Chorotega have kept a pottery tradition running that predates the Spanish. The clay comes from a specific local deposit, the pigments are mineral, ground from iguana stone and other local sources for the black, white and rust colours, the pots are shaped by hand without a wheel, burnished with a smooth stone, and fired in domed outdoor kilns of clay and brick. The motifs are pre-Columbian, animals and geometric bands. Almost every house in the village has a workshop and the pieces are sold from the doorway.

What you actually see

• Hand shaping - built without a wheel and burnished with a stone.
• The mineral pigments - ground locally for the black, white and rust.
• The outdoor kilns - domed clay ovens fired in the yards.
• The motifs - pre-Columbian animals and geometric bands.

When to go

December to April is drier and the road easier. Weekdays are when the workshops are working. San Vicente, the next village, has the same tradition with fewer visitors. Buying directly from a household supports the makers rather than resellers.

Honest expectations

Coach tours arrive at set workshops and the demonstration can feel perfunctory; walking further into the village and knocking at a working house gives a much better experience. Prices at the tour-stop workshops are higher. The pieces are fragile and awkward to carry home. Some of what is sold in Guanacaste resorts as Guaitil ware is made elsewhere.

Nearby

Santa Cruz is twenty minutes; the Nicoya beaches are an hour west.