Lake Palace

Seen from the shore of Lake Pichola in Udaipur, the Lake Palace seems to have no foundations at all: a low composition of white marble pavilions, terraces and domes that rises straight from the water. The island is Jag Niwas, about four acres of natural rock, and the palace was built there between about 1743 and 1746 by Maharana Jagat Singh II of Mewar as a summer retreat, deliberately designed to look as if it floats. It faces east, so that the sunrise could be greeted from its terraces.

For generations the rulers of Mewar used it as a place to escape the heat and the formality of the City Palace on the shore. Courtyards lined with columns, fountains and gardens held their summer durbars; inside, walls of black and white marble were set with coloured stones and ornamental niches, and a circular upper room some 21 feet across was paved in black and white marble under a dome. During the uprising of 1857 Maharana Swaroop Singh sheltered European families fleeing from Nimach on the island, destroying the town's boats so that no one could follow them.

The 19th and early 20th centuries were less kind: travellers described the palace as slowly mouldering in the damp air of the lake, and by the 1950s it stood empty. In the 1960s Maharana Bhagwat Singh turned it into Udaipur's first luxury hotel, and since 1971 it has been run by Taj Hotels, with a further restoration in 2000. Its unreal beauty has made it a film set more than once, most famously as the home of the title character in the 1983 James Bond film Octopussy.

Getting there

The palace lies in Lake Pichola, about 4 km from the centre of Udaipur, and Maharana Pratap Airport (UDR) is about 22 km away. It operates as a hotel; public boat rides on the lake leave from Rameshwar Ghat next to the City Palace and pass close to the palace on their way to Jag Mandir.