How are babouches (Moroccan slippers) made?

The babouche souk in Fes is one of my favourite corners of any medina — a tunnel of tiny stalls hung floor to ceiling with slippers in lemon yellow, rose pink, saffron and gold, the air thick with the smell of cured leather. Behind many of the stalls sits the man who actually makes them, hunched over a low bench with a half-finished slipper in his lap, and watching him work is half the reason to go.

It begins with the leather — usually goat or sheep, tanned and dyed in the same medina (the yellow ones traditionally coloured with pomegranate). The cobbler cuts the upper and the sole pieces with a curved knife against a worn wooden board, working from templates so familiar he barely glances at them. The classic men's babouche is plain and pointed; women's versions get embroidered, sequinned, or trimmed with gold thread by separate specialists before the cobbler assembles them.

The construction is the clever bit. He stitches the soft upper to the sole using waxed thread and a curved awl, sewing the slipper inside-out so that when he turns it the right way round, every seam disappears inside and the outside is smooth and seamless. He hammers the sole flat, shapes that signature upturned toe over the edge of his bench, and burnishes the leather with a smooth stone or bone until it shines. A practised maker finishes several pairs in a day, and the rhythm of the awl and the little hammer never stops.

To see it, head into the leather and slipper sections of the Fes medina — the streets around the Chouara tannery and the Attarine quarter are full of working cobblers — or the babouche souk in Marrakech. Buy direct from the maker if you can; you will pay less than in the tourist shops and you will have watched your slippers being finished. A relaxed Fes itinerary gives you the time to wander, watch, and bargain properly over a glass of mint tea.