Can object design advance environmental sustainability and social justice?
Join the co-curator of Reclaim + Repair: The Mahogany Project, Toby Barratt of Propellor Studio, for a compelling conversation with four local designers who use their skills and creativity to support the development of a circular economy. Local designers Brent Comber, Christa Clay, Josiah Peters and Kaly Ryan have each built design practices that place principles of sustainable design at the centre of their production. The conversation will explore the diverse ways that these designers approach the use of natural materials, their methods of production, and the environmental and social impact possible with the adoption of regenerative design practices.
Tickets include admission to the Museum’s galleries before the event.
Date: Thursday, March 7, 2024
Time: 6:30 – 8:00pm
Tickets: $20 General Admission (plus fees and taxes)
About the exhibition:
The idea for Reclaim + Repair: The Mahogany Project was born out of a desire to honour the reclaimed mahogany and the places from which it originated. The Mahogany Project hosts a diverse group of 31 emerging and seasoned local designers and makers who created 22 objects made from vintage mahogany. The exhibition features a wide array of design objects from furniture, lighting and household objects to jewelry and much more!
Mahogany Art for Sale:
Works created by designers for the exhibition are for sale. A portion of the sales will be donated to support Indigenous-led reforestation efforts in Central America, where the mahogany was extracted in the last century. Click here to read more about the items for sale and how you can purchase them.
Meet your moderator
Toby Barratt
Toby is a partner and designer at Propellor, a multi-disciplinary art and design studio based in Strathcona. Propellor’s work spans a broad range of disciplines from lighting and furniture design to exhibition design and sculpture.
About Propellor Studio:
From Vancouver is Awesome profile with Toby Barratt.
Propellor Studio is Toby Barratt, Pamela Goddard and Nik Rust, who became creative allies while studying sculpture at Emily Carr University and formed Propellor in 2000 with the intent of combining their skills as artists and designers. They thrive on creative challenges that allow them to blur the boundaries between art and design and combine their love of sculpture with their skills as designers and makers. There are common threads that run through their work: an interest in the forms and systems of the natural world, a passion for uncovering an idiosyncratic beauty in the objects they design and a desire to make work that will last well into the future.
Propellor’s lighting work and sculpture hangs in public spaces, hotels, restaurants, boutiques and private residences around the world. Their design, as well as their sculptural work, is regularly shown in museums in Canada and abroad.
meet the designers
Brent Comber
Brent Comber’s practice explores generation, connection, permanence. and impermanence. Embedded with memory, the materials he works with—wood, predominantly distinct tree forms, and light—are elemental to the story being told, with their story and his own inextricably linked to the Pacific Northwest. This place, as a physical environment and a sensorial experience, has shaped who he is and how he sees himself as an artist. Sculptural, and often large-scale or inherently purposeful, his work invites the viewer to reimagine their relationship with the natural world.
Christa Clay
Christa Clay is a Texas-born designer and circular economy professional passionate about supporting resourceful and resilient communities. Her practice is place-based and rooted in circular economy principles: designing out waste, keeping materials at their highest value for as long as possible, and regenerating natural systems. Her expertise includes food systems, textiles, design research and circular economies, and relies on cross-industry collaboration and co-design. She co-founded Studio AY with Kevin Isherwood in 2021.
Kaly Ryan
Kaly Ryan is an award-winning Industrial Designer (BDes) with over eight years of experience in furniture design and manufacturing. She is passionate about inclusive design and has always been curious about the intersection of design and health. In 2022, Kaly founded Capella Design, the first lifestyle brand reimagining home mobility products as beautiful furniture and accessories. Through Capella, Kaly is working to reduce the stigma of accessible furniture in order to improve physical and emotional well-being at home.
Josiah Peters
Josiah Peters is a principle at Lock and Mortice and is passionate about the intersection of design and manufacturing. He believes through honest and conscious design we can bring ideas and products to market that benefit our region and provide richness to the lives impacted by them.
This program is part of our Why I Design Series.
About the Series: Why I Design spotlights and connects local and international designers and creatives of various works and projects to the public. Through interactive talks, workshops, and tours—the series is an opportunity to both examine and be inspired by individuals and collectives who are making design happen by bringing together people, systems and materials to develop meaningful impact within their communities. Why I Design is an opportunity to interact with the designers and makers of things and environments that shape our lives.
Please note: Photographs and/or video will be taken at this event. By taking part in this event you grant the event organizers full rights to use the images resulting from the photography/video filming, and any reproductions or adaptations of the images for fundraising, publicity or other purposes. This might include (but is not limited to), the right to use them in printed and online publicity, social media, press releases and funding applications. If you do not wish to be photographed please inform an event organizer.