Santa Clara Pueblo, NM

Santa Clara Pueblo, also known as Kha’p’o Owingeh, is a Tewa community along the Rio Grande in northern New Mexico. Kha’p’o is associated with the Valley of Wild Roses and Singing Water, names that connect the pueblo to its landscape and language. The community lies between Ohkay Owingeh and San Ildefonso, with traditional homelands extending from the eastern Jemez Mountains to the Rio Grande floodplains. The 2020 population was 930, and students attend schools in nearby Española.

Santa Clara is one of the Eight Northern Pueblos and maintains a living Tewa cultural tradition through language, land knowledge, history, music, and family practice. Its black and red polished pottery, often finished with incised designs, is one of the best-known expressions of local artistry, carried forward by generations of makers. The pueblo is not a museum piece: it is a present-day tribal community whose lands, government, homes, and cultural work remain connected. The river corridor and surrounding mountains show why place, memory, and craft are so closely woven together here.