Tinian
— the runway the jungle keeps quiet.
Not only on a wall.
“A small island in the Northern Mariana Islands, about three miles south of Saipan across the Saipan Channel. Roughly a hundred square miles of raised limestone plateau and quiet coastline, settled by the Chamorro people two thousand years ago and rebuilt slowly after 1945. North Field, where the B-29s took off in August of that year, has been left as overgrown coral runway and shrine.
Tinian, 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.
Tinian is one of three populated islands in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a United States territory in the western Pacific. It sits about three miles south of Saipan across the channel of the same name. The island runs roughly twelve miles long and covers about a hundred square miles of raised limestone plateau. Around three thousand people live in San Jose, the only village, on the south-west coast. Tinian has been inhabited by the Chamorro people for at least two thousand years.
The House of Taga, near San Jose harbour, is a row of latte stones — limestone pillars with cap stones, the structural feet of ancient Chamorro houses. One pillar still stands; the others were toppled by the 1902 earthquake. The site is named for Chief Taga, the legendary leader said to have raised them around the year 1500. They are the largest latte stones still standing in the Mariana archipelago and the most-visited Chamorro heritage site on the island.
North Field, on the island's northern plateau, was the largest operational airfield of the Second World War. From its four parallel runways the B-29 Enola Gay took off on 6 August 1945 carrying the first atomic weapon used in war; Bockscar followed three days later for Nagasaki. The jungle has reclaimed most of the field; the atomic bomb pits and a section of Runway Able are preserved as a National Historic Landmark, dedicated in 1985.