Copper artistry flourishes in Mexico's Santa Clara del Cobre

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At first look, this unassuming Mexican pueblo doesn't make much of a case for itself. The brightly painted cement-block buildings, the always-under-renovation colonial church, the charming plaza all say this is quaint, rural Mexico.

A shop displays copper wares on a sidewalk arcade in Santa Clara del Cobre, Michoacan. The town of 12,000 people is home to hundreds of artisans skilled in hammered copper.

Only when you look a bit more closely does Santa Clara reveal itself. There's a glitter in that shopkeeper's window, something flashy just inside his neighbor's door. Look at the sunlight reflecting off the wares displayed up and down the little town's main street.

It's the shine of copper.

Modest little Santa Clara del Cobre, population 12,000 and 7,000 feet high in the western highlands of Michoacan, is home to hundreds of artisans skilled in the craft of hammered copper. In 40 or so shops lining the town's two major streets, all manner of copper items are for sale.My wife and I browse, and the first things to stand out are the cazos, washtub-size cooking pots used for centuries to cook carnitas, fried pork skins, candies and scores of other favorite Mexican dishes.

A craftsman hand-tools a design into a bathroom basin at one of about 100 shops that sell copper objects.

The pots are familiar to anyone who has traveled much in Mexico. You see them for sale throughout the country, lined up in roadside displays along the busiest highways. A shine catches your eye, you stop, and as you peruse the inventory, you ask the vendor where he's from. The answer is always the same: "Michoacan, señor. Santa Clara del Cobre."

After several such encounters, my wife and I are visiting the source.

As we continue to browse, we congratulate ourselves on coming. The pieces are beautiful. Passing from shop to shop, we see copper that has been pounded into jars, bowls and bells, sinks and statuary, a bathtub so deep one could soak in water right up to one's nose. Some items are embellished with colorful paints, but most dazzle with the simple natural beauty of hammered copper.

In D'Arte-Sano, one of the many shops we visit, we meet manager Gustavo Lopez. He tells us that Santa Clara del Cobre, designated a Mexican historic monument in 2001, has been a center of copper craftsmanship since pre-Columbian times. But it was the Spanish Bishop Vasco de Quiroga, who arrived at nearby Lake Pátzcuaro in 1536, who taught Santa Clarans the skills that their descendants practice so deftly today.

Copper bathroom basins and pots tempt passers-by at a roadside copper stand.

Later Lopez gives a tour of the D'Arte-Sano workshop, where about 100 craftsmen pound about 10 tons of copper into shape every month. Several workers are cutting big sheets of copper into manageable sizes. Others pound the smaller sheets with hammers to give them their characteristic pattern.

Skilled workers twist, wrap and solder the pieces of copper into basic forms. The fine work is left to the master artisans who carefully tap in decorative stars, rope braids, bull horns, butterflies, flowers, bunches of grapes and other designs using a variety of hammers and punches.

A symphony of hammers rings throughout the shop, from the whump, whump, whump of rough work to the tink, tink, tink of final embellishment. It's all done without power tools of any sort.

Lopez says Santa Clara's products have broadened to include bathroom and kitchen sinks, mirrors, picture frames, tabletops and those huge bathtubs.

"We export a lot of all of those," he says.

Indeed, 30 to 40 percent of D'Arte-Sano's sales are to stores in the United States and Canada, Lopez said. And 20 percent of his inventory is sold over the Internet (www.dartesano.com).

The copper, once mined in local mountains, now comes from foundries in Guadalajara and Mexico City that recycle copper wire.

The citizens of Santa Clara are proud of their artisan traditions. In the plaza stands a copper gazebo. A few blocks away is the Museo Nacional del Cobre, the town's copper museum. Copper light standards illuminate the square at night. And from the lampposts hang replicas of the copper cazos.

Lopez says his shop is one of perhaps 100 in Santa Clara. To meet the need for skilled workers, the shops offer training programs, families pass skills from father to son, and the local middle school offers classes in the hammered-copper process. Artists come from around the world to study at institutes.

Although Santa Clara isn't a huge tourist destination, Lopez says, it isn't uncommon to encounter people from all parts of the world, particularly in August during the annual Feria del Cobre (Copper Fair). The event offers exhibits, a market and a copper-work competition.

After our visit to Santa Clara, I am driving near Puerto Vallarta when I see a copper merchant along the road. On a whim, I stop. "Where are you from?" I ask.

"Michoacan," he says. "Santa Clara del Cobre."

Of course.