Spearfish historic downtown
— brick storefronts and a creek running through Main.
Not only on a wall.
Spearfish historic downtown, 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.
“Spearfish sits where Spearfish Canyon opens onto the plains, and its downtown still carries the bones of a late-1800s railroad and ranching town. Main Street runs a few blocks of brick storefronts, with the 1906 Matthews Opera House anchoring one corner and Spearfish Creek slipping through a city park a block away. The D.C. Booth Historic National Fish Hatchery, founded in 1896, sits at the edge of downtown with its wooden footbridges and pond of fat rainbow trout. The street is walkable, the coffee is good, and the canyon mouth is fifteen minutes south. from the studio
The place, in three passes.
Spearfish is a town of about 12,000 people in Lawrence County, South Dakota, at the northern edge of the Black Hills where Spearfish Creek emerges from its canyon onto the plains at roughly 3,740 feet. Downtown runs along Main Street between roughly 5th and Hudson, a district of two- and three-story brick commercial buildings dating largely from the 1890s to the 1910s. The town was founded in 1876 during the Black Hills gold rush and grew as a supply center for nearby Deadwood and Lead. Black Hills State University, founded in 1883 as a normal school, sits a few blocks west of downtown and shapes the year-round rhythm of the place.
The downtown commercial district is on the National Register of Historic Places as the Spearfish Downtown Historic District, listed for its concentration of late-19th- and early-20th-century brick masonry buildings. The 1906 Matthews Opera House, with its restored proscenium and 250-seat auditorium, is the most prominent. Several blocks retain their original cornices, transom windows, and pressed-metal façades; the bricks were largely fired locally. The D.C. Booth Historic National Fish Hatchery at the eastern edge of downtown, established in 1896 by the U.S. Fish Commission, includes the original superintendent's Victorian house, a wooden archive building, and stocked rearing ponds open to the public.
Most downtown businesses keep daytime and early-evening hours, with shops along Main Street typically open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and restaurants later. The Matthews Opera House runs a year-round season of theater, music, and gallery exhibits; tickets are available through the box office. The D.C. Booth hatchery grounds are free and open daily during daylight hours, with the historic buildings and museum staffed seasonally from late May through mid-September. Spearfish City Park, with its creek-side paths and the Spearfish Falls of the dam-pond, is a five-minute walk from Main and is the easiest way to put the creek inside a downtown afternoon.
