Friday, Apr. 02, 2010

Bonus Souvenir: Peruvian Crafts

Still longing for more? Lima has a crafts store for every taste and wallet size. Start at Mercado Indio (Indian Market), a crafts-market strip stretching four blocks (Blocks 52 to 55) along Avenida Petit Thouars in Miraflores. Everything from bric-a-brac to fossilized shark teeth is available in literally hundreds of shops. Be wary of cheap deals on silver (likely low grade) or artifacts and fossils, which are legal to buy, but illegal to take out of the country.

For traditional crafts, visit Manos Peruanas, also in Miraflores, which has a crafts museum and top-quality goods. The store is open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m to 6 p.m.

A similar shop is Las Pallas in the Barranco district, run by an expat Scottish woman who has spent years scouring Peru for goods and cultivating relationships with local craftsmen. Las Pallas has folk art and crafts from all of Peru's diverse regions; it's open Monday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.