Meerschaum Carving

Meerschaum - sea foam in German, lületaşı in Turkish - is a hydrated magnesium silicate that occurs in commercial quantity in very few places, and the deposits around Eskişehir are the best known. It comes out of the ground damp and soft enough to cut with a knife, hardens as it dries, and is extremely light and porous, which is why it became the material for tobacco pipes: it absorbs the tars and colours gradually from white through honey to deep amber with use, and a well-smoked old pipe is prized for exactly that. Carvers work the wet block into pipes, and into the figured bowls the trade is known for - faces, animals, mythological heads - then polish with wax. Workshops in Odunpazarı carve and sell, and the museum there shows historic pieces. Raw meerschaum has been export-restricted at various points to keep the carving in Turkey, and the deposits are finite, so the good material is not cheap.

What you actually see

• The wet carving - the block cut soft and shaped by knife.
• The figured bowls - faces and animals carved into pipes.
• The colour change - old pipes gone amber with use.
• The Odunpazarı workshops - carvers working and selling.

When to go

Year-round; weekday working hours to find carvers at the bench. The museum in Odunpazarı keeps standard hours and closes one day a week.

Honest expectations

Genuine block meerschaum is expensive, and pressed or reconstituted material is sold as the real thing - ask, and buy from established workshops. Pieces are fragile and need careful packing.

Nearby

Odunpazarı's old streets and the OMM are around the workshops; the mines themselves are outside the city and not visitable.