Saint Ignatius Mission with Mission Mountains
— — a brick church the mountains take seriously.
Not only on a wall.
“A red-brick mission church on the Flathead Indian Reservation, with the wall of the Mission Mountains rising directly behind it. The Jesuits finished the building in 1891. Inside, fifty-eight murals cover the walls and ceiling, painted by a cook and lay brother who had no formal training. Most visitors stop on the drive between Missoula and Glacier and stay longer than they meant to.
Saint Ignatius Mission with Mission Mountains, 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.
Saint Ignatius Mission stands in the town of St. Ignatius, Montana, on the Flathead Indian Reservation, fifty miles north of Missoula on US Route 93. The current brick church was completed in 1891 by Jesuit missionaries and Salish parishioners, replacing an earlier log chapel from 1854. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Mission Mountains rise abruptly to the east, with McDonald Peak at 9,820 feet visible from the parking lot. The mission remains an active Catholic parish serving the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.
The church is built of locally fired brick over a hewn-timber frame, with a tin-clad steeple and round-arched windows. The interior is the surprise. Fifty-eight murals painted between 1900 and 1904 by Brother Joseph Carignano, an Italian-born Jesuit lay brother who served as the mission cook, cover the ceiling, walls, and apse with biblical scenes and saints. Carignano had no formal art training and worked with pigments at hand. The cycle has been restored several times since the 1970s and remains the principal reason art historians make the drive.
The mission is open to visitors daily, generally from morning through late afternoon, with current hours posted at the parish office. There is no admission fee; donations support upkeep. A small museum in the adjacent log cabin holds period photographs and liturgical objects. Visitors are asked to be quiet inside the sanctuary, which remains in active use for Mass. The Mission Mountains photograph best in late afternoon, when the western light cuts across the brick facade and catches the snow line on the high wall above.