Glendalough
— — the morning the mist sits on both lakes.
Not only on a wall.
“The valley of the two lakes, in the granite hills south of Dublin. St. Kevin built his monastery here in the sixth century. The round tower, the small stone churches, the carved crosses are still in the meadow, still tended. The Upper Lake reads dark even at noon. Buses come from the city most mornings; by late afternoon the valley mostly belongs to the rooks and the wind off the heather. The mist sits longer here than anywhere else in Wicklow.
Glendalough, 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.
Each tile ships in a kraft box, tied with cream ribbon, with a handwritten note from the studio if you'd like to add one.
Three or five different vistas, hung together — a chapter of places you've been, or want to go.
The place, in three passes.
Glendalough, anglicised from the Irish Gleann Dá Loch (the valley of two lakes), sits in the eastern foothills of the Wicklow Mountains, about 50 kilometres south of Dublin and within Wicklow Mountains National Park. The valley was carved by glaciers during the last Ice Age, leaving a U-shaped trough that holds the Upper and Lower lakes, fed by the Glenealo River and the Poulanass stream. The site is reached from the R756 by way of the village of Laragh, with regular bus service from Dublin via St. Kevin's Bus. The visitor centre and Pilgrim's Trail open daily; the lakes and ruins are unfenced and free to walk.
The monastic city was founded by St. Kevin in the sixth century, and the surviving stonework largely dates from the tenth through twelfth centuries. The round tower stands about 30 metres tall, built of mica-schist with a granite doorway set six metres above the ground. It served as both bell-tower and refuge for the monastery, and its conical cap was rebuilt from original stones in the nineteenth century. The Cathedral, St. Kevin's Church (called Kevin's Kitchen for its chimney-like belfry), the Priest's House, and Reefert Church all sit within a short walk on the floor of the valley. Carved high crosses and grave-slabs are tended by the Office of Public Works.
The Upper Lake sits about half a kilometre west of the monastic ruins, ringed by steep granite walls that hold sound. Most coaches arrive between ten and noon; by three the lake belongs again to the cuckoos in May, to the red deer of the Wicklow herd, and to the wind off the Spinc above. The Spinc Trail, about nine kilometres along the white-arrow route, climbs to the cliff above the southern shore for the long view back over the valley. Glendalough sees roughly a million visitors a year, almost all of them in the daylight middle of the day.