the forager mosaicist

Rachel Sager bought a coal mine by accident in 2015. Or maybe on purpose. The line between the two has always been fuzzy for her.

What started as a ridiculous idea — turning the abandoned Banning #2 coal mine in Fayette County, Pennsylvania into an international mosaic art destination — became The Ruins Project. Over the past decade, Rachel has welcomed 500+ artists from six continents to build what she calls "a cathedral to coal" on eleven acres of concrete and green regrowth. Mosaics of miners, canaries, trains, and forty Pennsylvania birds now cover the walls where her grandfather's generation once dug bituminous coal.

A fourth-generation daughter of coal, Rachel has turned this legacy into a thriving small business — bricks and mortar at The Ruins, online teaching, Substack writing, and a new memoir, Ruins State of Mind: Building a Cathedral to Coal, coming fall of 2026. She builds her work from the same first principle her mother taught her: crown the ordinary with uncommon titles, and people will see what you want them to see.

Multiple Best in Show awards in juried exhibitions. MAI 2018 Best Architectural & Site-Specific Mosaic for The Fishers of Men*, County Mayo, Ireland. 2026 Keynote, Appalachian Literary Arts & Storytelling Festival.*