Point Imperial
— — where the canyon turns east into the Painted Desert.
Not only on a wall.
“The highest viewpoint on either rim of the Grand Canyon, at 8,803 feet, looking east where the Colorado River bends out of Marble Canyon and the country opens into the Painted Desert. The sandstone spire of Mount Hayden stands close in the foreground. The North Rim is closed by snow much of the year, and even in July the air at this altitude carries the smell of spruce and fir.
Point Imperial, 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.
Point Imperial sits at 8,803 feet on the North Rim of Grand Canyon National Park, the highest viewpoint on either rim. From the overlook the canyon turns east, with Marble Canyon and the Vermilion Cliffs in the middle distance and the Painted Desert beyond. The sandstone spire of Mount Hayden rises sharply in the foreground. The point is reached by Cape Royal Road, eleven miles north and east of the North Rim Lodge. The North Rim is open seasonally, typically from mid-May through mid-October.
East-facing rim viewpoints in the Grand Canyon are unusual, and Point Imperial is the most dramatic of them. Sunrise lights Mount Hayden before the surrounding canyon, then sweeps across the Painted Desert in the long minutes after. The colour shift through Marble Canyon is slow and unmistakable, redder and quieter than the showier sunsets the South Rim is known for. Photographers and Park Service interpretive guides both call dawn here a single-tripod morning rather than a quick stop.
At 8,803 feet, the air at Point Imperial is appreciably thinner than at South Rim viewpoints across the canyon. The North Rim sustains a ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, and quaking aspen forest that climbs nearly to the edge. Summer afternoons bring fast thunderstorms across the Kaibab Plateau, and lightning closes the point regularly. Snowpack typically blocks Cape Royal Road from late October until mid-May. The North Rim receives fewer than one in ten of the park's annual visitors.