Kochi is a port city on the Malabar Coast in Kerala, southwest India. Known historically as Cochin, it sits on the Laccadive Sea and serves as the financial and commercial capital of the state, with a metropolitan population of over 2.1 million.
The city’s importance as a spice trading centre stretches back to antiquity, when the port of Muziris traded with Roman, Persian, Arab and Chinese merchants. Portuguese forces established Fort Kochi in 1503, and the city later passed to Dutch and then British control, remaining under the Kingdom of Cochin as a princely state. Today Kochi is noted for infrastructure projects including the world’s first entirely solar-powered international airport and India’s only water metro system. The city hosts the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, India’s first contemporary art biennale, which has run every two years since 2012. Historic landmarks such as the Chinese fishing nets reflect centuries of maritime trade along this coast.
