Cary
— — a town that grew up around its trees.
Not only on a wall.
“A planned town in the Piedmont, west of Raleigh, where the streets bend around the longleaf pines instead of cutting through them. The Triangle's quietest corner: SAS to the south, Bond Park to the north, and an amphitheatre that fills on summer Saturdays. Sidewalks. Greenways. The kind of place people move to and then stay.
Cary, 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.
Cary sits in Wake County, North Carolina, about ten miles west of downtown Raleigh, inside the Research Triangle bounded by Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill. The town was incorporated in 1871 and named by founder Allison Francis Page for Samuel Fenton Cary, an Ohio prohibitionist he admired. Population crossed 174,000 at the 2020 census and has since climbed past 180,000. The land is rolling Piedmont, threaded with hardwood forest and the headwaters of Crabtree Creek. SAS Institute, the analytics company, holds its headquarters here on a wooded campus south of the town centre.
The town's calendar turns on its festivals. Lazy Daze, an arts and crafts gathering, has run since 1976 and draws crowds into the downtown streets each August. The Diwali Cary festival, held at Koka Booth Amphitheatre, is one of the largest in the Southeast, reflecting the South Asian community that has grown alongside the Triangle's tech corridor. Spring brings Spring Daze at Bond Park, and the amphitheatre's summer season fills weekend evenings with the North Carolina Symphony and touring acts under longleaf pines.
Downtown Cary Park opened in 2023 on Academy Street, seven acres of fountains, a great lawn, and a carousel where the old library once stood. Fred G. Bond Metro Park covers 310 acres to the north, with a 42-acre lake, boat rentals, and a trail network that connects to the American Tobacco Trail. Koka Booth Amphitheatre sits on the south side of Symphony Lake. Parking is free at all three sites. The greenway system links them, and most of central Cary is walkable between them.