All Arts and History

Rural Heritage Day, the fourth Saturday in October, is a celebration of history, reverie, and reminiscence dedicated to the hard-working founders of Ste. Geneviève. Come see how it used to be done: whether it’s farming, cooking, spinning, lace-making, leatherworking, soap-making, wood carving, gardening, apple pressing or good old-fashioned games. Read more…

Rust Artisan Shop  At 173 North Main Street in downtown Ste. Genevieve, Rust Artisan Shop transforms Missouri’s surplus corrugated tin into luminaries and lights that cast perfect shadowed images onto walls and ceilings. Owner Sam and her team of local artisans have created a gallery where recycled materials become art—corrugated tin salvaged from old barns and buildings finds new life as functional sculpture. The shop’s tagline says it simply: “At Rust, we make stuff from recycled products.” Featured in Missouri Life magazine, this Main Street mainstay represents the kind of authentic, locally-rooted creativity that makes Ste. Genevieve’s shopping scene distinctive. As one visitor noted: “We purchased several pieces from the shop to remember this awesome spot. Love, love, love!” Recycled Relics and Artisan Craft Rust Artisan Shop specializes in the “Recycled Relics” line—products made entirely from reclaimed and donated materials. The signature pieces are tin luminaries and lampshades crafted from old corrugated tin, creating distinctive lighting that projects intricate patterns. Candle holders, ornaments, and signs emerge from scraps that might otherwise end up in landfills. The philosophy centers on utilizing Missouri’s abundant supply of vintage corrugated tin from deteriorating barns, sheds, and agricultural buildings across the region. The transformation from Read more…

Sainte Genevieve Art Center & Museum – Historic Legacy Meets Living Creativity Nestled comfortably in the shadow of the historic Sainte Geneviève Catholic Church at 310 Merchant Street, the Sainte Genevieve Art Center & Museum occupies a place of quiet significance in both the physical and cultural landscape of Missouri’s oldest town. This isn’t just another small-town art gallery—it’s a vital institution that illuminates Ste. Genevieve’s surprisingly important role in American art heritage while serving as an active, thriving hub for contemporary creativity. A Building with Its Own Story The Art Center is housed in a stately Norman-Revival stone building that itself tells a story of community pride and celebration. Built in 1934 in preparation for the city’s bicentennial celebration, the structure reflects the civic confidence and architectural ambition of Depression-era America. The choice of Norman-Revival style—with its solid stone construction, arched openings, and medieval European echoes—was particularly fitting for a town celebrating its French colonial heritage. That this beautiful building now serves as home to the Art Center creates a perfect synergy: historic architecture preserving and presenting both historic and contemporary art. The stone walls that once marked a bicentennial milestone now safeguard the legacy of artists who found Read more…

Sainte Genevieve Memorial Cemetery At 5th and Merchant Streets, where a hillside slopes toward what was once open prairie, Memorial Cemetery holds more than 3,500 known burials and perhaps 1,500 additional unmarked graves—a total approaching 5,000 souls whose wooden crosses rotted away over 235+ years, leaving most graves anonymous. This is not the orderly, manicured cemetery of contemporary imagination but rather something more honest: crowded ground where 235 years of deaths compressed themselves into earth, where French colonists buried in 1787 rest beneath Confederate soldiers buried in 1881, where the absence of markers tells its own profound story about mortality, memory, and what happens when time erases deliberate effort to remember. A Cemetery That Remembers Through Absence Established in 1787, Memorial Cemetery was formally blessed in 1791 according to Church records and functions as physical archive of Sainte Genevieve’s entire post-contact history. The oldest existing tombstone belongs to Marie Theres St. Gemme, who died in 1807—though earlier burials certainly occurred between 1787 and 1807, marked then by wooden crosses now long consumed by earth and time. This cemetery contains physical remains of people who lived under French rule, Spanish administration, and American governance—people who witnessed the Louisiana Purchase transform their Read more…

Schultz Antiques – Where 42 Years of Family Expertise, Custom Refinishing, and Carefully Curated Collections Meet Southeast Missouri’s Most Trusted Antique Destination Some antique stores are weekend hobbyists selling grandmother’s attic contents. Others are impersonal warehouses where dealers rent booths and merchandise turns over so rapidly that no one actually knows what they’re selling. Schultz Antiques is neither. This is family-owned operation that’s served Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois for 42 years—four decades of building expertise, cultivating relationships with collectors and estate sales, developing refinishing skills that transform damaged pieces into functional furniture, and establishing reputation that makes “call Schultz” the automatic response when locals need antiques appraised, estates liquidated, or vintage furniture restored to usable condition. Located at 24534 US Highway 61 in St. Mary, Missouri (just north of Sainte Geneviève), Schultz Antiques occupies the sweet spot between serious antique dealing and accessible family business. The owners know their inventory—not just what’s in stock, but where pieces came from, what restoration work they’ve received, why particular items are priced as they are, and which customers have been asking for exactly this style of hutch or that specific type of table. The wide range of antiques, collectibles, and furniture means Read more…