Simple Pleasures: Celebrating Columbus Day

This Columbus Day, I finally get to use my birthday gift—a weighty cast-iron dish with a rich dark patina, cast in bas relief to commemorate the Landing of Columbus. The scene, rendered in rugged detail, shows the Great Navigator and his men stepping onto the New World’s shore, planting the flag of Spain. Its dark sheen and timeworn surface give it the air of an heirloom—a small but tangible link to history, steady, enduring, and quietly magnificent. Happy Columbus Day!