Changbai Mountains
— — a crater lake held between two countries.
Not only on a wall.
“A volcanic range on the border between China's Jilin Province and North Korea, with Heaven Lake set in a caldera at the summit. The highest peak rises to 2,744 metres. The mountain last erupted catastrophically around the year 946, one of the largest eruptions in human history. The lake is held in by sixteen peaks, frozen for most of the year, and split by the boundary line so the water belongs to neither country alone. — from the studio
Changbai Mountains, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
The Changbai Mountains run along the border between Jilin Province in northeast China and Ryanggang Province in North Korea. The range is volcanic in origin and centres on a single massive stratovolcano whose summit caldera holds Heaven Lake, known in Chinese as Tianchi and in Korean as Cheonji. The highest peak, called Changbai in Chinese and Paektu in Korean, rises to about 2,744 metres. The Chinese side is protected as the Changbaishan Biosphere Reserve, designated by UNESCO in 1979.
Heaven Lake sits in the summit caldera at about 2,189 metres, ringed by sixteen peaks. It is roughly 4.85 square kilometres in area and reaches a maximum depth near 373 metres, making it one of the deepest crater lakes on earth. The lake is the source of the Songhua and Tumen rivers, which drain north and east across Manchuria, and feeds the Yalu, which runs south as the border with Korea. The water is frozen from roughly November through June each year.
The mountain produced one of the largest volcanic eruptions in the last two thousand years, an event known as the Millennium Eruption, dated by tree-ring and ice-core evidence to the winter of 946 CE. The eruption ejected an estimated 100 cubic kilometres of material and deposited ash as far as Hokkaido. The peak is also sacred ground in Korean tradition as the legendary birthplace of Dangun, founder of the first Korean kingdom, and remains a powerful symbol on both sides of the border.