Honanki cliff dwelling
— — the rooms the cliff agreed to hold.
Not only on a wall.
“A Sinagua cliff dwelling tucked under a south-facing sandstone alcove at the base of Loy Butte, in the Coconino National Forest west of Sedona. Built and lived in roughly between 1100 and 1300, then walked away from. The masonry holds at the back of the alcove, and the rock face above carries pictographs in red, black, and white from the Sinagua, Yavapai, and Apache people who used the site across centuries. The name Honanki, given later in Hopi, is read as bear house.
Honanki cliff dwelling, 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.
Honanki sits at the base of Loy Butte in the Red Rock Ranger District of the Coconino National Forest, about 15 miles west of Sedona by way of Boynton Pass Road and Forest Road 525. The Southern Sinagua built and occupied the cliff rooms between roughly 1100 and 1300 before leaving the Verde Valley. Archaeologist Jesse Walter Fewkes documented the site for the Smithsonian in 1895 and gave it the Hopi name Honanki, meaning bear house. The site sits at about 4,640 feet on the southern edge of the Colorado Plateau.
The dwelling has roughly 60 ground-floor rooms tucked under a long south-facing alcove of Schnebly Hill sandstone, with masonry walls of stacked sandstone slabs set in mud. The rock face above the rooms carries one of the longer pictograph panels in the Verde Valley, layered across centuries: Archaic geometric figures, Sinagua red handprints, and later Yavapai and Apache work in red, white, and black mineral pigments. The site is a National Register of Historic Places listing and is co-stewarded by the Forest Service with the Hopi, Yavapai-Apache, and Yavapai-Prescott tribes.
Honanki requires a Red Rock Pass, sold by the Forest Service, and is reached over about nine miles of unpaved Forest Road 525 from Arizona 89A; high-clearance is recommended and most rental cars do not make it in wet weather. The half-mile interpretive loop from the parking area is guided by trained site stewards during posted hours, typically 9:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Touching the masonry or the pictographs is not allowed. The cooler months from October to April are the comfortable window.