Palavelli for Ganesh Chaturthi

Ganesh pooja without palavelli seems incomplete. In the southern part of India, especially Andra Pradesh it is a tradition to hang the wodden grid called palavelli above Lord Ganesha during Ganesh pooja. The pooja prep starts with placing the palavelli.

When we were kids we used to wait for my dad to tie it up to the window and we would decorate it with hanging fruits, mango leaves and flowers. Same was the case with my husband’s family when they were kids. So for both of us Ganesh pooja has fond memories and he is our favorite god too 🙂

And we both performed the pooja post marriage with the same enthusiasm and devotion but one thing that we missed was the palavelli. We thought we should get one from India in our next visit.

However, my husband decided to make one from the basic wood trims and dowel rods available @ Homedepot. He designed it in a way that it can be taken apart easily and reassemble too. Here is how it looks 🙂

It is simple, easy and a quick project. And we have been using from past 5 years and it still looks great and easy to assemble every year before pooja.

All the supplies are available at the local home improvement store..

What you need:

Decorative trims from Homedepot  – 8 pieces ( sold as 8 ft panels and the HD staff helped us to cut into 2 ft trims)

1/2 inch Hardwood round dowels from Homedepot

Magnets – 8

Small hardware nails

Hot Glue Gun/Gorilla wood glue

Basic wood squares (left over from my Golu Padi Project)

Let’s assemble the pieces:

Start by laying the decorative trims as a grid (4×4) and use hot glue gun/wood glue to glue the pieces.
Use the hardware nails and add the small wood square base to the dowel rod. This helps in giving some support and stand up well as a mandir. Next add the mangets on the 4 corners of the grid and the dowel rods. Make sure you place the magents on the right side before gluing them. The magnets glue well with hot glue gun.

And Tadahh…..

You have the palavelli ready. Decorate the grid and the dowels rods as per your style.

If you have a plan to hang it you can totally skip the dowel rods and hang the grid and use it. And post pooja they are easy to store as well.

Here is a picture from 2016.

This year Ganesh pooja is falling on a public holiday ( here in the US). I have a week left and can’t wait to make a handmade idol and have the pooja pictures in my next post.. 🙂

Happy Ganesh Pooja!!

PLEASE NOTE : THIS PROJECT CAN BE MADE FOR PERSONAL USE ONLY, NOT FOR SELLING OR REPLICATION AND REPOSTING ON DIGITAL MEDIA ( YOUTUBE/INSTAGRAM/WEBSITES).