Phelps Lake overlook
— — the lake the moraine keeps quiet.
Not only on a wall.
“A glacier-carved lake at the mouth of Death Canyon, held in by a moraine, seen from a small overlook about a mile and a half in from the Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve Center. The trail climbs gently through lodgepole and aspen, opens at the rim, and the lake lies below — long, deep, dark blue, with the Tetons standing straight up off the west shore. The Rockefeller family kept the land quiet on purpose; the preserve caps daily visitors and prohibits dogs. The water reads cold from the overlook. It is. from the studio
Phelps Lake overlook, 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.
Phelps Lake sits at the southern end of Grand Teton National Park, at the mouth of Death Canyon, held in place by a glacial moraine left from the last ice age. The lake covers about 525 acres and reaches roughly 160 feet deep, at an elevation of around 6,633 feet. The most-walked overlook is on the Lake Creek-Woodland Trail loop out of the Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve Center, about 1.7 miles in from the trailhead. The preserve was a gift from Laurance Rockefeller to the National Park Service, dedicated in 2008.
The preserve was designed for quiet. Laurance Rockefeller asked that the trails be kept narrow, that interpretive signs be sparse, and that the parking lot cap the number of people on the ground at any one time — the lot holds about 50 cars, and once full, rangers turn cars away. Dogs, bicycles, and horses are not allowed on preserve trails. The center itself was designed by Carney Logan Burke around the idea of a sensory walk in. The result, at the overlook, is a lake that often reads silent even on a midsummer afternoon.
The Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve Center sits on the Moose-Wilson Road, about 4 miles south of Moose, Wyoming. The center is open from late May through early October, typically 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; the trails are open year-round but the road closes to vehicles in winter. From the trailhead, the Lake Creek-Woodland loop to the overlook and back runs roughly 3 miles round-trip with about 400 feet of gain. Bears use this drainage; rangers ask hikers to carry spray and travel in groups of three or more.