Art of Old Town Ipoh

Our first destination in Malaysia was a small quaint town called Ipoh surrounded by limestone cliffs and lush greenery. Situated 200 kilometers to the north of Kuala Lumpur, it was Malaysia’s second city during British rule and the center of world tin industry. The city is quite famous for heritage, food and beautiful cave temples. On our very first day, we took the Heritage Trail ( more about this in the next post ) and a new addition to the Heritage trail is the “Art of Old Town Ipoh“, a walking tour hunting murals.

The old town walls have been changed into a piece of art by many different artists from all over the country and budding artists from the town, quite famous among them is Lithuania-born artist Ernest Zacharevic who has also painted murals on walls along the streets of Penang’s Georgetown. ( The first six on the list are painted by him)

Wondering, what’s mural ??  A mural is a piece of artwork which is painted or applied directly on a wall or other surface, incorporating it harmoniously with the architecture or other fixtures perfectly blending with surrounding objects to give a 3D effect.

Each and every painting depicts the old laid back style of locals, culture, and history of the city.

Join us on a virtual walk to some of the famous murals of Ipoh.

Old man drinking coffee:

The first mural shows a portrait of an old man drinking coffee. White Coffee is quite famous in Malaysia and you cannot miss that whilst your trip to Malaysia. The mural is located near the famous OldTown White Coffee eatery.

Paper Plane:

As we walked down further after sipping hot cuppa White Coffee, we found our second mural which had two children enjoying their childhood on a paper plane.

HummingBird :

The third mural depicts a hummingbird hovering in search of food from the nearby tree.

History of Tin Mining:

This shows Ipoh’s evolution from a tin-mining town in the past. The drawing depicts a scene of an old-fashioned tin-mine and the ways it was done. Elephants were used for carrying goods and tin were exported to different parts of the world by sea.

KOPI “O”

This mural depicts the birth of White Coffee. Kopi “O”, despite being black coffee has been shown hanging on the walls of a building.

Girl Tip Toeing:

The mural illustrates a girl tiptoeing on a classic red plastic chair and some books on top of it trying to reach out to a cage of birds. The painting has been blended perfectly with other objects like chair and cage.

Laid Back Locals:

There are other murals painted by various another artist which depicts the laid back lifestyle of locals residing in Ipoh.

Chasing Boy:

This one is definitely the funniest one of all. Hidden in alleys of a cafe with walls covered with creepers, colorful locks and post boxes of the bygone era.

Stay Tuned for Upcoming Posts on: 

Heritage Trail – Ipoh

Hotel Review – The Weil Hotel

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The Tales of a Traveler was part of Fam Trip organised by Malaysia Tourism.

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