Flathead Lake from Wild Horse Island
— a long view across pale water, from a quiet island.
Not only on a wall.
“Flathead Lake covers about 191 square miles in northwest Montana, the largest natural freshwater lake west of the Mississippi by surface area. Wild Horse Island sits near its centre, a 2,160-acre day-use state park reachable only by boat. From the high meadow on the island's south side, the view crosses pale water to the Mission Mountains on the far shore, with bighorn sheep often grazing the slope below.
Flathead Lake from Wild Horse Island, 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.
Flathead Lake fills a glacially carved basin in northwest Montana, with a surface area of roughly 191 square miles and a maximum depth near 370 feet. The southern half of the lake lies within the Flathead Reservation of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes. Wild Horse Island, the largest of the lake's islands at about 2,160 acres, lies near the western shore between Big Arm and Dayton and has been a Montana state park since 1977.
The lake is among the cleanest large lakes in the populated United States, with summer surface temperatures reaching into the low seventies and visibility regularly past twenty feet. It drains southward through the Flathead River. Wild Horse Island has no permanent surface streams; the high meadows look out across more than a mile of open water in every direction, with the Mission Range rising steeply along the eastern horizon. Wind on the lake builds quickly on summer afternoons and drops at dusk.
Wild Horse Island is day-use only: no overnight camping, no fires, no dogs. Access is by private boat or charter from Big Arm, Dayton, or Polson; the state park maintains a few primitive landings and a network of foot trails. A small herd of wild horses, descended from animals placed on the island by the Salish and Kootenai, still ranges the interior alongside bighorn sheep, mule deer, and nesting bald eagles. Most visitors plan a half-day on the water and a couple of hours on the trails.