Box Butte Reservoir
— a long lake the prairie almost hides.
Not only on a wall.
Box Butte Reservoir, 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.
Each tile ships in a kraft box, tied with cream ribbon, with a handwritten note from the studio if you'd like to add one.
Three or five different vistas, hung together — a chapter of places you've been, or want to go.
“An earthen dam thrown across the Niobrara River in 1946 holds back a long, narrow reservoir north of Hemingford. The lake covers about 1,600 acres at full pool, set in a treeless mix of grass and yucca. Walleye and northern pike work the deep channel; pelicans rest on the points each spring. The water is the bluest thing the panhandle has. — from the studio
The place, in three passes.
Box Butte Reservoir lies on the upper Niobrara River in the Nebraska panhandle, about 10 miles north of Hemingford and 28 miles southeast of Chadron. The earthfill dam was built in 1946 by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation as part of the Mirage Flats Irrigation District, the first Reclamation project completed in Nebraska. At full pool the reservoir covers about 1,600 acres. The surrounding 2,400-acre Box Butte Reservoir State Recreation Area is managed by Nebraska Game and Parks for fishing, boating, and primitive camping.
The reservoir is best known for walleye and northern pike. State records have been broken here, including a 29-pound 12-ounce northern pike taken in 1985 that stood for decades. Smallmouth bass, white bass, and channel catfish round out the fishery. Water clarity runs high relative to other panhandle waters because the Niobrara above the dam carries less silt than the Platte system. Spring and fall are the productive seasons; the lake draws down in late summer for irrigation releases to Mirage Flats farms downstream.
Box Butte is one of the quietest state recreation areas in Nebraska. There are no developed cabins, no marina, and limited shoreline trees. Camping is primitive, with a vault toilet and a hand pump. The nearest town with a grocery is Hemingford, population around 800. At night the lake holds Bortle 2 sky in most weather, and the Milky Way reflects in still water on calm summer evenings. Coyote and pheasant fill the silence the wind leaves behind.
