In Kochi’s Jew Town, historical heritage houses have been renovated to welcome guests – Atulya Yatra

The 350-year-old AB Salem House on Jew Street opened its doors to guests in the last week of January this year. It was Abraham Ben Barak (1882-1967) aka AB Salem, a lawyer and activist, who participated in India’s independence movement and was popularly called the Jewish Gandhi. The heritage home now exudes history with its redesign.

Two houses down toward the Paradeshi Synagogue, the 17th-century home of Rabbi Rahabi Ezekiel, will open by mid-year as a boutique hotel called Ezekiel House. Formerly known as Leila Manzil, its most famous resident, Rabbi Ezekiel, was a merchant who donated famous hand-painted Chinese tiles to the Paradesi synagogue at the end of the street.

Work has been going on since pre-Covid days at another Jewish home, once owned by the late Elias Koder, a prominent businessman. It will be opened as an eight-room hotel in the middle of next year.

Sephardic Jews (called Paradeshi or foreigner) came to India in 15^Th and 16^Th A century after they were expelled from Spain. A group went to Cochin and settled around their shrine. Synagogue Lane in Jew Town became a residential area and a thriving center from 1958 until Jews began immigrating to Israel.

The area first saw change in the 90s when local businessmen bought properties. By the early 2000s almost all the houses had changed hands with the exception of a few and were owned by local businessmen. As tourism boomed, most of them were rented out to Kashmiri traders, who converted them into shops retailing handicrafts. Big masala warehouses started selling antiques collected from the interior of Kerala and South India. Jew Town became a market for antiques and spices. The iconic Pardesi Synagogue (closed on Saturdays) attracts a steady crowd of tourists, receiving around 1,000 footfalls every day.

Civil works

The current phase of major change – the launch of boutique hotels – comes on the wings of civic and beautification works by Cochin Smart Mission Limited (CSML).

“The drains have been rebuilt and the entire lane paved, giving it a European look. The lane has 11 antique style lamp posts and seven three-seater cast iron arm chairs, which are kept by CSML. As the lights come on in the evening, people sit on chairs quietly reflecting. It’s beautiful,” said Junaid Sulaiman, who runs the Mocha Art Cafe opposite the synagogue. His family, Abdul Karim Mohammed, bought properties in the area early on.

Junaid, who grew up in the area, says that property in Jew Town has heritage value, and prices here are steadily rising every year even though the streets are narrow and the buildings are old. He gave an estimate of ₹50 lakh ballpark at one cent (436 square feet). Over the past two decades, many of the front rooms of Jewish homes have become handicraft shops that do a brisk business with tourists, so rents have skyrocketed. Typically the initial lease price is, “a substantial advance and an initial monthly rent of around ₹45,000.”

A major makeover

Hotelier Jose Dominic AB bought Salem and Ezekiel House when they came up for sale in 2017 and 2018. He plans to reopen them as smaller, more intimate hotels.

Dominic, former MD of CGH Earth Hospitality Group, says, “As the Jews left, the lane became home to shops selling handicrafts and antiques, mainly to tourists. If they close, the street becomes a ghost town in the evening. to bring back jOye de vivreIt is being converted back into a residential route.

Before the influx of boutiques and tourists, it was the center of a thriving community of Jews – Koders, Cohens, Salems, Rabbis, Ashkenazis and Hallegwas, who lived here with extended families and staff. The lane fronts these houses as parties, weddings, rituals and processions flow from the houses to the street. “In the evenings tables with food and chairs were brought out and the community came together,” Jose said, adding that kosher food was available locally, “and there was a butcher to cut and certify kosher meat.”

Riding the tourism wave, Ginger Hotel first opened in 2018 on the road adjacent to Synagogue Lane. Formerly a ginger warehouse, its eight rooms offer high-end luxury with gold-plated wash basins, Moorish tiles, Turkish mirrors and royal Rajasthani artefacts. “The perfumery business has started to decline and there is good potential to do something different,” says owner Majnu NB, who bucked the trend. With hotels coming up, he said, “the nature of the place remains untouched, only the amenities have improved.” Ginger Hotels Rs. Rooms are retailing for ₹12,000 to ₹22,000 and have 70% occupancy, he said.

Mandalay Hall, the closest property to the chapel, is next door. The hotel’s five rooms are furnished with contemporary art and refreshingly new architecture. Now run by The Postcard Hotel, known for its intimate luxury settings, it is completely sold out in season, but each room is priced at a relatively hefty ₹25,000 per night excluding taxes.

Entrepreneur Edgar Pinto, who owns two popular properties in Fort Kochi, Kashi Art Cafe and Old Harbor Hotel, bought Hallegua House in 2018 because of his “love for heritage buildings” and because he could “downsize” it. The house at the beginning of Jew Street was called Krati Veedu. Used by the community to host a party Sukkah Or the Feast of Tabernacles and Sima Torah or Joy of the Torah (Scrolls) which is where the bridegroom dresses for the wedding. It is now open as Kashi Hallegua House, a museum and art space.

Pinto, who recently restored the property, said it’s difficult to estimate the cost of maintaining the heritage property to “full glory” because “it’s a bottomless pit.” He added, “The current set of owners of these properties values ​​heritage and restoration. Architecture and history are the narrative of Jew Town and should be preserved.

Redesign Rules

Mridula Jose, an interior architect who worked on the reconstruction of AB Salem and Ezekiel House, talks about the challenges of opening houses that have changed hands several times and gone through many alterations and additions. “The goal was the adaptive reuse of the family home for a tourism project that still retains the old lifestyle on Jew Street,” she says, pointing out period features such as four-part doors, vaulted ceilings and wooden staircases. Nests are retained in built-in shelves and walls.

She also kept the mosaic floor, done “sometime in the 50s or 60s” in the AB Salem house, as a fascinating relic. “The original Jewish houses in Mattancherry were contiguous with front and back entrances opening onto parallel streets. The layout is often narrow with a courtyard in the middle. A lot of the old houses are split down the middle with different owners,” Mridula said, while Absalem House continued as a family home for generations, while Ezekiel House changed hands and belonged to a non-Jewish family.

According to her, the new owners lived there for a while and later converted it into a soap manufacturing unit, multiple labs, storage facility, retail outlet and most of the original premises were occupied. She is currently in the process of renovating the space to include six bedrooms, a cafe and a small courtyard.

A renovated AB Salem house with four rooms, each facing a balcony or courtyard or street, with distinctive features like a kitchen to prepare a continental breakfast and a caretaker’s unit, from Rs 5,000 to Rs. Rs. 7,000.

Before the COVID 19 lockdown, AB Salem House hosted AB Salem’s granddaughter Linda Hertzman and husband Steven Hertzman who were delighted with the new look. Mridula says, “She said we retained the essence of the home and the character of her Jewish home.”