Our experience visiting Fes Tanneries (Chouara Tannery)

We came to the N10 shop to see the tannery right at opening in the morning, which was great, as it wasn’t yet as hot. This might have helped with the smell.

Getting to the N10 shop can be a bit complicated, as other shops displaying number 10 signs outside can trick you into visiting the wrong one. You must follow the exact N10 sign into the shop.

When you enter the shop, you will be given mint leaves to mask the tannery’s smell. Then, you can walk around the leather shop and see the tannery from one of the terraces.

Scammers on the streets of the Medina

A common scam in Fes is people telling you that you’re going the wrong way. And it’s been happening for a long time.

We knew exactly where we were going in Fes, but on the way to the Chouara Tannery, 10 different people told us we were going the wrong way and that the tanneries were somewhere else. We believe in hopes of guiding tourists to their own shops, or potentially bringing them to a dead end and maybe even robbing them (yes, unfortunately, that does happen too often in Fes).

Since we knew this was a scam, it wasn’t a problem to just either completely ignore them as if they didn’t exist or tell them NO.

However, there was a guy who got super offended that we didn’t fall for it and said, “Oh, you think you know everything. Don’t read too much stuff online. It won’t always end up good in Morocco.” Not sure if this was a threat, but we managed to get rid of him, and he didn’t follow us.

It’s a shame that this has been happening for so long. Although if you report them to the police, by the time they come, they’ll be long gone in one of the thousands of narrow streets of the Medina.

That’s why if you don’t want to search around for the exact place yourself, you can join a tour that visits the tanneries. This way, you get guidance around the whole area and more insight into what you’re looking at.

Why are the stone pits different colors? 

When you visit at the right time of day, you can see pools having different vivid colors. The color depends on the tanning stage and the dye/color used for the pool at that time.

On our visit, that wasn’t really the case, since it was cloudy. But it was still fascinating to observe the Chouara Tannery, which uses a thousand-year-old traditional method to make leather.

How bad is the smell really?

The smell at Fes tanneries definitely isn’t pleasant, but it depends entirely on the day of your visit. On hot days, it smells horrible, and on cloudy and windy days, not so much.

For example, during our visit to the Fes tanneries in early April, the smell wasn’t that bad. We definitely recognized the different smell, but it was nowhere near as bad as we expected.

The worker at the shop from which we observed the tanneries gave us mint leaves to mask the smell, but we didn’t end up using them.

What we find absurd after visiting

We didn’t know what to expect from the tanneries, especially because of how they’re portrayed on social media. After visiting, we can confirm that the Chouara Tannery is worth visiting while in Fes.

As the name implies, Fes tanneries are places where animal hides are transformed into leather products such as bags, jackets, slippers, shoes, belts, and much more.

But then you have tourists walking directly through the tanneries where people work, and, in some cases, even lying down between the tanneries’ pools to take photos from above.

We can’t really understand why anyone would want to go, first of all, to walk through there or lie down in the chemicals. Plus, there’s also cow urine used in the process. 🤷

The tanneries in Fes do look visually stunning. That’s true. But what’s too much is too much.

Things that almost ruined our experience

Something that surprised us is that you might not always be welcome at the famous N10 shop.

We visited the shop not long after they opened. We were very nice and upfront about being there to check out the tanneries, and they were happy to have us visit.

But after about 10 minutes, it became clear they wanted to rush us through our visit. They even told us that “people usually spend a few minutes there and that this is a very busy place”.

This made no sense, as we were literally the only visitors there at the time, and even after we told them we’d like to stay a bit longer, and we left, there was still nobody there, just the workers.

We completely understand wanting people to be quick with their visit, so that more people get a chance to see them. But when nobody else is there, we don’t understand the need to rush and kind of belittle the only visitors.

Of course, we also tipped them before leaving, since it’s something we planned to do from the beginning, as we unfortunately aren’t interested in leather products.

From what we’ve read and seen online, they’re completely fine with this type of visitor, so we’re really not sure what went wrong. Hopefully just a miscommunication!

Please note that they weren’t mean to us, but we constantly felt like we were bothering them, and that they were completely dissatisfied with us being there.

Also, unrelated to the N10 shop, a tannery worker sent kisses to Arijana multiple times during our visit. This was the first and last time something like this happened in Morocco! And it’s important to understand that this tannery operates like a collective, and that one worker’s actions don’t represent all others.

Final thoughts

So if you’re asking yourself whether the Fes tanneries are worth visiting, we’d say yes, absolutely. It’s an unmissable part of any Fes itinerary, and something that the city is very proud of.

You don’t get to see similar places elsewhere in the world, at least not so up close. So for us, it was definitely worth a visit.