Whidbey Island Fort Casey
— — the guns the war never came for.
Not only on a wall.
“Fort Casey on the west bluff of Whidbey Island, looking across Admiralty Inlet toward Port Townsend and the Olympics beyond. The concrete batteries sit in a long line above the water, the disappearing guns still on their carriages, the small white Admiralty Head Lighthouse keeping the inland edge of the field. Wind moves through the parade ground most days, and the ferry to Port Townsend works the channel below the bluff. The Olympics catch the late light to the west. from the studio
Whidbey Island Fort Casey, 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.
Fort Casey Historical State Park sits on the west side of Whidbey Island in Island County, Washington, on a bluff above the south entrance to Admiralty Inlet. The fort was built between 1897 and 1901 as one of the three coastal-defence posts forming the Triangle of Fire, intended to deny entry to Puget Sound; the other two were Fort Worden across the inlet at Port Townsend and Fort Flagler on Marrowstone Island. The 467-acre park preserves the concrete gun batteries, parade ground, and the 1903 Admiralty Head Lighthouse. The Coupeville-Port Townsend ferry runs from the dock just below the bluff.
The batteries are built of mass concrete, set into the bluff to present the smallest possible silhouette from the water. Two ten-inch disappearing rifles on Battery Worth recoil down out of sight after firing; both were returned to the site in 1968 from a similar fort in the Philippines, since the originals had been scrapped for the First World War. Admiralty Head Lighthouse, completed in 1903 to a Spanish Revival design by Carl Leick, is no longer an active aid to navigation and now serves as an interpretive centre run by Washington State University Extension.
The park is open year-round from 8 a.m. to dusk; a Washington State Discover Pass is required for day-use parking. The batteries are open to walk through, and Admiralty Head Lighthouse is generally open Thursday through Monday in season, with shorter winter hours. The Coupeville-Port Townsend ferry docks at Keystone Harbor immediately below the bluff and is the easiest crossing from the Olympic Peninsula to Whidbey. Coupeville, on Penn Cove three miles north, is the obvious lunch stop, with mussels in season from the cove and a quiet historic main street.