Canada
Cape Dorset — Kinngait in Inuktitut, meaning "high mountain" — perches on the southwestern shore of Baffin Island, overlooking the Hudson Strait and the vast expanse of Foxe Basin, in a location that has attracted human habitation for at least 4,000 years. The ancient Dorset Culture people, who gave the Cape its archaeological name, left behind carved miniature figures and tools of extraordinary refinement that rank among the earliest art forms produced in North America. But it is the modern Inuit art movement, born here in the 1950s through the visionary collaboration of artist James Houston and local carvers, that has made Cape Dorset famous worldwide as the "Capital of Inuit Art" — a title the community of 1,400 holds with justified pride.
The West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative, better known as the Kinngait Studios, is the heart of Cape Dorset's artistic life and one of the most important printmaking studios in the world. Since 1959, the annual Cape Dorset Print Collection has been released to international acclaim, featuring lithographs, stonecut prints, and etchings by artists whose names — Kenojuak Ashevak, Pitseolak Ashoona, Shuvinai Ashoona, Tim Pitsiulak — are revered in galleries from New York to Tokyo. The studio welcomes visitors during the summer months, offering a rare opportunity to watch master printmakers at work and to purchase prints and carvings directly from the artists who created them — an experience that transforms abstract appreciation into visceral understanding.
The landscape surrounding Cape Dorset is Arctic tundra at its most elemental. In summer, the hillsides burst with the brief, intense colour of Arctic wildflowers — purple saxifrage, yellow Arctic poppies, and white mountain avens that complete their entire life cycle in the few weeks between snowmelt and freeze-up. The Mallikjuaq Territorial Historic Park, accessible by a short boat ride from town, preserves Thule and Dorset archaeological sites where stone tent rings, fox traps, and food caches lie undisturbed on the tundra, their presence a quiet testament to the ingenuity of people who thrived in one of Earth's most demanding environments for millennia.
The wildlife of the Cape Dorset region reflects the abundance that has sustained Inuit life since time immemorial. Caribou migrate through the area in autumn, walrus haul out on the rocky shores of the strait, and beluga whales and bowhead whales traverse the coastal waters on their seasonal journeys. Polar bears, while more commonly associated with Churchill, are present in the region and sightings from town are not uncommon. The Inuit relationship with these animals is not one of mere observation — country food, including caribou, Arctic char, seal, and muktuk, remains central to the community's diet, cultural identity, and spiritual life.
Cape Dorset is visited by expedition cruise ships navigating the Northwest Passage or exploring eastern Arctic Canada, with passengers typically landing by Zodiac on the community's beach. The navigable season is brief — July through September — and every visit is subject to the ice and weather conditions that govern all Arctic travel. The community requests that visitors respect local protocols, particularly around photography of individuals and private spaces. For those who make the journey, Cape Dorset offers something genuinely rare: an encounter with a living artistic tradition of global significance in the landscape that inspired it.