Písac Artisan Market

The Písac market began as a produce exchange, the trueque, where highland communities brought potatoes, chuño and wool down to swap for maize and valley goods, and a version of that still happens at the edges on Sunday mornings. What fills the square now is textiles, alpaca knitwear, ceramics, silver, painted gourds and souvenirs, spread across the plaza and the surrounding streets every day of the week with Sunday the largest. Quality varies enormously: some stalls sell genuine handwoven pieces from the weaving communities of the valley and the Cusco highlands, others sell machine-made acrylic that is honestly cheaper and dishonestly described. Learning to tell them apart - checking the reverse of a weaving, the feel of the yarn, whether the dye smells - is worth ten minutes before buying anything expensive. Sunday also brings a mass in Quechua at the church and a procession of varayoc, community officials with silver-topped staffs.

What you actually see

• The square - textiles, knitwear, ceramics and silver filling the plaza daily.
• The Sunday scale - the largest day, with traces of the old produce exchange.
• The varayoc - community officials with silver staffs at the Sunday mass.
• The range - genuine handweaving alongside machine-made acrylic.

When to go

April to October. Sunday is biggest and busiest; weekdays are calmer and prices are often better. One to two hours, usually combined with the ruins above.

Honest expectations

A great deal of what is sold as handmade is not. Prices start high for tourists and bargaining is expected. Sundays are extremely crowded with coach groups. The Quechua mass is a service, not a performance.

Nearby

The Písac ruins are above the town; Calca and the Sacred Valley run downstream.