Place des Ferblantiers

The square has two names: the French one, Place des Ferblantiers, and the local one, Kzadria. Both refer to the people who earned their living here by working white tinplate: thin sheet iron coated with tin.

On March twenty-ninth, nineteen ten, a woman traveler recorded what the craftspeople were doing in the shops around the square. Jewish tinsmiths took empty kerosene cans and food tins, cut them up, flattened the metal, and made teapots, coffeepots, butter dishes, and lanterns from it. They even covered wooden doors with the flattened sides of the cans. Such a door was inexpensive, withstood blows better, and was considered a source of pride for its owner.

This was how the craftspeople made their living: containers that had already done their first job cost almost nothing, while a teapot or a lantern could be sold. The craftsman's hands created the earnings—they had to turn a smooth vessel out of thin sheet metal that already had bends, holes, and old seams. The buyer received an item needed in the home; the tinsmith received payment for restoring the metal's value.

The workshops gathered here because of the gate. The square was then also called Great Mellah Square. Beyond it began the walled Jewish quarter, and in the evening the gate was closed—at the beginning of the twentieth century, this happened at nine o'clock. The square remained outside, on the route between the Mellah, the Medina of Marrakech, and the palace district. Jewish craftspeople could work near their quarter and sell their products to the whole city. The name Kzadria grew out of this daily trade.

In the middle of the twentieth century, most Jewish families left the Mellah. Many of the former customers and shop owners disappeared, but Muslim craftspeople who had worked here alongside them continued working metal. There were fewer teapots and butter dishes, but more and more workshops shifted to metal lamps, bought for hotels, restaurants, and homes.

Now cafés and shops selling finished goods stand around the square, and far fewer working workshops remain. But the name still describes the current occupation: local craftspeople still make lanterns from copper sheets and used food tins.