News — copper

Mexico By Hand has been buying hammered copper vases in Santa Clara del Cobre, Michoacán since we started in 2004. But it wasn’t until a decade later that we received our first order for a copper cazo. In case you aren't familiar, cazos are essentially large cooking pots with handles and without a lid-- very traditional in Mexico for cooking a variety of foods over an open fire. Cazos are most known for cooking carnitas, but they’re also good for making candy and jam because copper conducts heat so well. It turns out that some farmers in the U.S. (as well as Australia) have discovered...

Mexico By Hand has sold a lot of hammered copper cazos this past year. Ever since the pandemic began we've had so many orders I honestly have lost count. Sales of cazos have helped to sustain us through these tough times of cancelled events and retail closures, and our customers as they are sheltering at home seem to appreciate our efforts to supply them. I suspected that the artisans in Santa Clara del Cobre are really hurting now due to lack of tourism and the cancellation of major sales opportunities for artisans like Semana Santa and Dia de los Muertos, and I hoped that...

  Gorgeous copper vases like this one are produced every day in small workshops scattered around one small town in Mexico -- Santa Clara del Cobre in the state of Michoacán--one of the places the U.S. State Dept. says we shouldn't visit. Every year I'm asked if I still go there, or someone tells me that they'd love to go back, but they sadly can't do that anymore, because, "well, you know--it isn't safe anymore". While I can't deny the reality of violence experienced by Mexican citizens due to the drug cartels, I tell you that the only sounds interrupting...