Sark
— — an island that kept the dark for itself.
Not only on a wall.
“Two square miles of cliff-edged plateau in the Channel Islands, reached by ferry from Guernsey and crossed on foot, by bicycle, or by tractor. No cars. A narrow rock isthmus called La Coupée joins the main island to Little Sark, with a sea on each side and a single guard rail. In 2011 the International Dark-Sky Association named Sark the world's first Dark Sky Island. On a clear night the Milky Way sits over the sea so plainly it looks drawn. from the studio
Sark, 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.
Sark is a small island in the Channel Islands, lying about eight kilometres east of Guernsey and roughly forty kilometres off the Normandy coast. It covers about 5.45 square kilometres and holds a population of around 500. The island is a self-governing dependency within the Bailiwick of Guernsey, governed by its Chief Pleas, and was the last feudal jurisdiction in Europe until reforms passed in 2008. The main island and Little Sark are joined by La Coupée, a narrow isthmus about 100 metres long with cliffs dropping roughly eighty metres to the sea on either side.
Cars are not permitted on Sark. Residents and visitors travel on foot, by bicycle, by horse-drawn carriage, or behind one of the small tractors that double as taxis and freight haulage. The ferry from St Peter Port in Guernsey takes about 55 minutes, landing at Maseline Harbour, from which a tractor-drawn passenger trailer climbs Harbour Hill to the village. The absence of engine noise is the first thing visitors notice, and the reason the island reads as a held place rather than a small one. The total length of road on Sark is roughly sixteen kilometres.
In January 2011 the International Dark-Sky Association designated Sark the world's first Dark Sky Island, the inaugural recognition of its kind. The designation rested on an island-wide lighting plan, the absence of public street lights, and sky-quality readings reaching about 21.8 magnitudes per square arcsecond at the zenith on clear nights. The Sark Astronomy Society runs occasional public sessions on La Seigneurie grounds, and small lanterns are the standard etiquette for walking the lanes after dark. The Milky Way is visible by eye through most of the year, and meteor showers read as cleanly here as anywhere in the British Isles.