Edward Burtynsky, Container Ports 8, Racine Port Montreal, 2001
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Photo: Mandy Barker- EVERY snowflake is different
In Canada, we toss away 3 million tonnes of plastic each year. Most of this is plastic packaging. Only 9% of plastic is recycled. The rest ends up slowly seeping into our soil, lakes, and oceans, whether that is within Canada, or in another country which we pay to receive this garbage. In 2021, 14% of Toronto’s plastic was sent overseas. Not only are we not recycling this plastic, but Canada incinerates 4% of plastics that are consumed. We are burning half of the equivalent amount of plastic we recycle.
So why are we doing this? The simple answer is there is a lot of money to be saved in using plastic packaging. Say you are a multi-national corporation selling various types of sugar water. You have a product with incredible margins, and a plastic packaging solution that costs roughly 2.6 cents per bottle, is extremely durable, and extremely light weight. Of course, there is a problem. These bottles take 450 years to decompose, and it can only be used one time. The marketing department has been working on a solution, tell the end consumer to recycle.
The lie here can be found directly in the marketing copy, RE-cycle, suggesting a cyclical system in which the end of one products life feeds back into the start of another. But this sugar water company uses 100% virgin plastic. All plastic purchased at a grocery store, and all plastic used for takeout is new plastic. They must use virgin plastic which are the only food safe plastic, and are only food safe for a single use. After that the plastic starts leeching and if re-used will slowly poison the food it holds. Other than a few fringe material development breakthroughs, almost no food safe recycled plastic packaging materials are currently on store shelves.
Even if we could increase our plastic ‘recycling’ programs from 9% to 100% of waste, there currently is no cycle. That is the heart of the problem, we will always have plastic waste if we are producing primarily virgin plastics.
Yes, there could be a future where we start taking advantage of more recent developments in plastic recycling. There are now recycled PET plastics being approved for food use (although with limited interest from the food container industry). But the main conversation should not be around improving our clearly broken recycling program. We have been ‘working’ on this for 50+ years with 9% to show for it. I also have a sneaking suspicion that these plastic recycling ‘breakthroughs’ will always conveniently be around the corner, and that is exactly how the current plastics industry likes it.
This is why I believe a solution to the problem lies in accountability and governance. Let’s start with relationships. The existence of almost all plastics starts between a supplier and a consumer. Both are responsible, and both need to be held accountable. With our current system we place all the responsibility on the consumer to properly use and dispose of the plastics. The supplier also needs to be involved in collecting, reusing, or disposing. We already have this system for glass bottles. If sugar water companies had to accept their packaging back, at the very least they would develop a system where they would find secondary use (and not just for 9% of the bottles).
Holding plastic suppliers accountable for their products hinges on the second part of this proposed solution, government intervention. There is a small movement growing now in the Canadian government under the ‘zero plastic waist agenda’ but with not too much to show for itself yet. As a first step at the beginning of this year the government banned a handful of single use plastics such as stir sticks, and six-pack rings. The ban took an additional two years to implement due to massive corporate pushback via feasibility studies and good old fashion lobbying.
These gains show the massive undertaking for the smallest tweaks to our current way of consumption. These changes need to be discussed outside of the framework of the individual. How are we meant to make a meaningful difference when the general public doesn’t even know what these materials are?
We call them ‘plastics’, but plastic is the state of the material, not the material itself. These materials are called polymers, and according to the recycling symbol system found at the bottom of your plastic bottles (the number in that three-arrow triangle symbol), there are 7 types, with #1 and #2 being the most widely accepted types of plastic that are recycled. #3-#7 tend not to be recyclable in most systems. Here is the kicker, #7 represents ‘other’ in the system. Number 7 is every other type of polymer that exists. The more I investigate plastics, the more I realize we, the public, know nothing about these materials, yet every one of us interacts and disposes of them every single day (A side note here of something I found while researching this newsletter: black plastic is not recyclable. It does not matter what type of plastic it is; it cannot be processed at recycling facilities. The reason we still produce black plastic is beyond me. This seems like the simplest change imaginable as it is just aesthetic.).
That brings me to the plastic use of my own company. All rugs produced by Mark Krebs are double packaged, first in a clear watertight polypropylene bag to keep moisture content at acceptable levels as to not cause mold or decay, then in a durable white woven polypropylene outer bag to insure no damage in transit. Both these materials are technically recyclable, but will not be, even if the end consumer sorts them correctly. I do not currently have another option. I am limited by what my rug weavers have available in their local markets. Also, what is most important environmentally speaking is that my rugs arrive undamaged, which plastic does and incredible job at. Think about the wasted material, transportation and labour involved in producing my rugs if even a small percentage of rugs were damaged in shipping.
I’ve been considering a way to somehow try and collect my packaging so I could bring it directly to a recycling plant pre-sorted by colour and in bails (insuring 100% will be used, albeit downcycled), but the logistics of returning plastic packaging has its own ecological footprint, not to mention price tag and labor for the end consumer.
The next logical step would be fully recyclable rug bags, which can be collected and sent back to the weavers. This solution faces the same issues as above, but with the additional complexities of getting them back to rural areas of India. This would be my ideal solution, and as I scale I could start trying testing with my suppliers in India.
I do not believe compostable packaging is feasible in the form of composting plastics. Not only because it is currently incredibly difficult (if not impossible) to supply to my weavers, but also because compostable plastic tends to be made from corn, which is food. Call me coo-coo, but we should eat food.
Ultimately, the packaging of high value items is at the bottom of the list of changes needed in the plastics industry as the importance of that packaging to deliver the item without damage is most critical. If a high value item is damaged, then a massive amount of resources have gone to waste. But we are currently in a position where we need to re-think an entire industry, so I will need to eventually find a long-term solution to eliminate plastic waste from my rugs.
We do need an immediate solution to plastic packaging for food products, which make up a huge chunk of plastic waste. The first step is everyone admitting that plastic recycling is not a thing and will never be a thing. We need to start thinking about the problem of one that both consumer and producer need to take responsibility for, and for governments to create policy that holds everyone accountable. If we keep allowing industry to leave consumers quite literally ‘holding the bag’ we will continue to destroy aquatic ecosystems and poison the drinking water of the poorest people on this planet.
Next time you are unsure if plastic you are tossing away is recyclable or not, just throw it in the trash. At the very least you are consciously taking ownership of the fact it is going into a land fill. If we continue to ignore that 91% of our plastic is not being recycled, we will never make any meaningful change.
]]>I recently took part in the High Point Furniture Market from October 14th to 17th. The setup was something special, which I dubbed 'the rug cake.' It was an eight-foot-tall free-standing structure with cascading levels showcasing 18 of our wool rugs. We were lucky to be able to show at the Shoppe High Point Show, a new event for High point and a place that focuses on smaller design forward brands.
We debuted some new additions to the rug line: the Chalk Rug and the Jade Rug. These collections focus on adding more strong neutral tones while keeping that Mark Krebs commitment to quality and craftsmanship. The feedback from the design community has been fantastic.
The Chalk Rug collection is a series of hand-woven wool rug strips, roughly the width of the human body. This size is ideal for the rug weaver to work quickly and independently. After weaving, the strips are placed side by side and hand stitched together to make a full-size area rug. The strip lengths are slightly varied, which gives the weavers room for error when weaving and adds a unique edge detail to the rug. The two-tone neutral stripe pattern is also varied, which brings more understated complexity to this otherwise subtle design.
This past August I got married to a beautiful and talented cook named Ruby. To celebrate her as well as the tail end of the summer cooking season, she has taken over the lunar letter this September to share her top summer pasta recipes.
Bon Appetit,
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“It’s the end of August… did you eat enough corn on the cob?” A friend of mine wrote this as an instagram caption years ago, and I have never been able to get it out of my head. There is something about the bounty of summer produce that as exciting as it is… is stressful! Am I taking advantage of it enough, and am I eating enough corn, peaches, Tomatoes? The window is so short in Canada. Where did the summer go?
While it can be stressful to try to pack it all in, for me there is such a joy in making a dish that I know I only make one to two times a year when the produce is in season. If I can just get it together to make it once, that is enough! It turns a regular dinner into a special occasion. It makes me think about what was happening in my life a year ago when I last ate it, and appreciate what I have around me. So, I am going to share a few of my favorite summer pasta recipes for you.
(Note: I am gluten free and use Garafolo, and Rummo gf pasta for my general at home pasta cooking needs. If you are able to, make these with the real deal baby).
Serves: 2. I’ve tried doubling it for 4 and it didn’t turn out as good as for 2, but that could be because of the gf pasta I was using. LMK how it goes.
Best month to cook: July
Why I like it: I started making this recipe this year. I am obsessed. It’s easy, and the taste is way more than the sum of its parts. It uses zucchini which is cheap, everywhere, not not always particularly good or exciting. There are few ingredients and somehow it is so delicious.
Serves: 3 (Weird... I usually modify the rations up or down to serve 2-4
Best month to cook: August
Why I like it: Yes, you need to get a blender out and that is annoying, but it’s worth it. This pasta tastes so creamy and wonderful and delicious. It’s the only pasta that I use another appliance for and make it 1-2 times a year. Again, It's worth it.
Serves: 2 but can be doubled easily. It will just take more time to fry the eggplant.
Best month to cook: August
Why I like it: This is a classic recipe! I’m sure there are lots of other great version out there but this is the one I make. It is relatively simple and oh so good. You could not use sausage and make it full vegetarian but if I’m going to make it once a year I figured I should just go for it.
Serves: 2 Could double it for 4 easily
Best month to cook: July-August
I started making this recipe last summer when I was growing oregano on my balcony and looking for something to do with it. While cherry tomatoes are decent all year round, they’re extra great in the summer and seem to pop up at markets earlier than larger summer tomatoes which have a pretty short season. This is my recipe based on pasta all’olio
It’s not too late to make some of these summer delights! So go… NOW! Cook! Enjoy the last days of summer with a tasty bowl of pasta, while the days are still long (kinda), and warm (kinda). You can check out my IG where I post my food frequently (@rubysnides) and infrequently (@rubycookingstuff) for more!
]]>Bref is… interesting. Every time I step into the shop I’m met with a brand-new assortment of products, prints and crafts that make me flag down one of the shop owners to ask where it came from. As someone who has been working in the design industry for a while now, I usually don’t have this experience (I tend to be the opposite: an unbearable patron, unloading this mostly useless design knowledge on sales staff). But Cynthia and Maude, the owners and curators of Bref, keep me on my toes.
Their shop is constantly evolving. Each season they develop a theme and do a complete store flip, curating an assortment of art and objects to tell their story. Bref's recent space expansion named La Maison in partnership with Montreal based furniture brand Alphabet is their take on a furniture shop. It’s located directly beside the original Bref shop, with a small passageway knocked down between. Due to the slower nature of the furniture industry, La Maison has a bit more of a permanent cast of design pieces but is still just as unique as the original store.
Thursday September 7th Bref will be celebrating its 7th birthday and launching their new theme for the season, black and white'. I’ll be launching two new rugs at the event in the La Maison space. come by 261 Rue Bernard from 5-8pm to celebrate.
2023 took off with a lot of travel for Krebs. Toronto, New York, Quebec City, Austin, Los Angeles, and a good chunk of the Australian continent. Being cooped up for so long it feels great to finally stretch one’s wings.
Traveling is a gift. Of course, this observation easily reads as cliché, but so do all adages. For it to ring true, like tearing up while watching a 90's rom-com on the plane ride, it takes vulnerability. You are creating space for something new. And this is the heart of why travel is so good at jarring us out of the humdrum ins-n-outs of our daily roost. Travel forces newness. Take a flight and you are faced with new time zones, flora & fauna, and local customs. But if the response is to not make yourself uncomfortable you won’t experience a widened perspective. You might as well not leave the nest.
What’s important here is beyond the travel, the plane ride, the nights out, and the weird bird species you catalog. It's how to see your average day at home. Viewing your day of working for eight to ten hours, then completing your million other boring and repetitive tasks with with new eyes.
This isn’t easy. It takes effort, and if you are like me, most of the time you are not going to have the energy to see this way. Many years ago, I took an summer internship in Reykjavik, Iceland. When returning home to Canada, I remember being hyperaware of the number of trees lining the streets and filling the forests along the highways. Iceland is almost void of trees. Over a thousand years ago the early settlers quickly cut down the native tree coverage to build... whatever Vikings were building back then, leaving the stunning, but relatively barren landscape of modern-day Iceland.
Feeling the presence of all the trees in this country only lasted a few days for me. But every now and again that feeling will float through as I walk by the maples outside my studio. If I’m open enough to catch it, these trees I see every day turn into the weird lifeforms they truly are.
This spring I hope to see a Queensland kookaburra in the eyes of my Montreal sparrows, a species local birding blog referred to as "one of the least desirable backyard birds". The guy who wrote that needs to get out more.
In 1785, the English inventor Edmund Cartwright unveiled a working prototype of an automated loom. For the first time in history, a piece of fabric was woven without the use of human hands. It was powered by a water wheel and made very low-quality cloth. This initial loom turned out to be a complete failure economically. Quality be damned, the seeds of innovation were sown, and the industrialists of England were off to the races, re-inventing and revising machine powered looms. Soon enough, it became impossible for fabric producers anywhere in the world working on hand looms to compete with the prices and volumes that were rolling out of England’s ever-expanding factories. The world had changed forever.
By the early 19th century there was a growing number of textile workers within England who started questioning this change. These weaving machines were taking away their jobs. They named themselves the Luddites, after Ned Ludd, a legendary (and probably fictional) worker rumored to have destroyed weaving machinery in a fit of rage. He was a symbol of the workers revolt against automation. The Luddites believed that the new machines were not only taking away their livelihoods, but also reducing the quality of the textiles they produced. They staged protests and sometimes resorted to violence, attacking factories, and destroying the new machinery. The government eventually cracked down on the Luddites, and the movement largely died out by the mid-19th century.
Last month the company OpenAI launched their new chat bot chatGPT to the public. By signing up for an account, anyone can ask questions to the AI software and have it complete simple tasks. Like most new things on the internet, I first used this software to make jokes with friends. I pushed to find the limitations of the chat bot by slowly increasing the absurdity of my prompts.
It could write fictional stories about other people in the room within a desired genre, suggest the appropriate emojis to use given specific contexts, and even give guidance on how big your ‘doughnut wall’ should be at your wedding.
The next day I asked the chat bot to help write captions for a few Instagram posts in the style of a Zen poem. The results were surprisingly good! They were also generated in less than 3 seconds.
“In the stillness of the loom, a thread of wool becomes a work of art. Hand-woven with love, our rugs bring warmth and harmony to any space”
“The gentle rhythm of the shuttle, the delicate interplay of colors, the softness of the wool underfoot. Our rugs are a celebration of the beauty of simplicity and the art of mindfulness”
“From the fields of India, to the hands of skilled craftsmen, to your home. Our wool rugs are a journey of tradition, passion, and connection.”
I took a screen shot of the chat and posted it to Instagram to gauge people’s reactions. Many people showed concerns of the software leading to job loss, and a general hollowing of the work being completed. It’s important to note that ChatGPT gets many things wrong. Like the first loom by Cartwright, this is not the version that will be taking your desk job. It does however seem to be the first prototype shared with the public that shows promise new tech will be automating a wide range of white-collar work.
Let’s imagine a large chunk of office work is automated away. Legal contracts can be created and tailored by someone with no training, customer service becomes immediate and incredibly flexible, and software code can write itself. Which of these jobs would you do if you weren’t getting paid to do it?
It's important to note, all tasks that AI can complete will still be available to us, just like anyone can hand weave fabrics. AI cannot rob us of producing paintings, writing poetry, or enjoying the act of baking. However, I don’t pretend that the weavers I work with in India are producing textiles for enjoyment. They are skilled trades people who weave to make an income. There are a few reasons that allow my company to buy and sell hand woven rugs in an age of automated looms.
Firstly, the industrial revolution is ongoing. India continues to keep many traditional production methods alive through a massive rural population that does not yet have access to the goods, services, and basic infrastructure we have in the west. We have also reduced the friction between borders and allow goods and services to flow between them, allowing people in India to have more access to our markets.
Secondly, automated looms over the last 200 years got much better at making uniform quality, overtaking hand loomed fabrics within the context of modern design principles. Machine made fabrics are stronger, more intricate, and perfectly uniform, all while costing less. This has led to a shift in aesthetic values, with most fabrics being produced by machine, and a (relatively) small market who see the beauty in the flaws created by the human hand.
Automated looms cannot be perfectly imperfect. The slight corrections and judgements made by the weavers at every yarn pass produce a quality in hand made rugs that is difficult to put into words. Automated looms also don’t like yarns that are perfectly imperfect, meaning the machine needs highly processed yarns, usually with a percentage of synthetic fibre or even 100% synthetic fibre. Natural fibres, similar to humans, also have flaws. You can’t make a sheep grow uniform wool. An imperfect wool yarn breaks a machine loom, but a weaver just adapts. The hand-feel of loosely spun 100% wool yarn is hard to beat, and hard for a machine to replicate.
In contrast to the slow century creep of industrialization, the risk from AI comes at the possible speed and scope of what can be automated. It’s possible that within a decade or so, AI could not just automate many lower income jobs, but also big chunks of middle-to-high income professions, all while pooling money in the hands of the few owners of such tech. Some nations will be better positioned than others to respond.
The automation of the loom and the subsequent rise of the luddites was that of financial strife with laborers and the owners of the technology, acting as an early movement towards workers rights, unionization, and new political ideologies. It’s worth noting Karl Marx wrote the communist manifesto in response to worker treatment within English textile factories.
In 1930, riding on incredible growth of labor-saving technologies the economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that his grandchildren would work just 15 hours a week. Of course, this turned out not to be the case. Humans are very good at inventing new jobs. It is possible we are at the beginning of a new economic era, and that the future holds ever more human driven tasks we couldn’t have thought of today. It would have been hard for a grandfather 80 years ago to imagine their grandchild having a thriving career as an online yoga instructor.
Instead of our best and brightest pouring into high-paying app start-ups, investment companies, and law firms (professions in which AI will likely be early to tackle), they focus on re-populating the collapsing ecosystems of our oceans, work with people living on the street to help stabilize their lives, or experiment with biodiverse agricultural practices. Or maybe they just spend their days writing poems for the people in their lives.
Yes, AI may be different than all other creative destruction that has come before it. The space between technology and biology seems to be blurring and we may finally be reaching the end of work as we know it. This could mean utopia, or dystopia. I have a feeling the future lands somewhere in-between.
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So, what to make of the moon? Earth’s natural satellite. Similarly, we take on the sun’s roll and pull her along for this epic galactic journey. She contrasts the sun’s life-giving energy. Desolate and cool, the moon is a reminder of the universe’s indifference. Its very matter formed from our native celestial body.
In earth's early history there was an impact. A rogue planet the size of mars slammed into spaceship earth. The collision caused massive chunks of our planet to fly off and collect around our orbit. Over time the debris collected and took the form of a sphere under its own mass. Of course, Earth also had to go through the same process after impact, incorporating this new rouge body and reforming a sphere. This impact most likely would have extinguished any life at that time. The moon is an artifact of how random our existence truly is.
The sun and the moon act as natural opposites. Yin and yang. It’s with this spirit that I have developed the first set of limited-edition sun & moon rugs. The first set, named Dawn and Half Moon, are in additions of 4 pcs to each size.
They are now in-stock and available on the site and at our retail partner Ah-bode Home in Bellville, Ontario. If you are native to Prince Edward County, go say hi to Angela and see the collection in person.
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It’s a time of day that doesn’t really exist. A time of myth. Too late to still be up, too early to get out of bed. A time that most people rarely experience. Because of this, 4am holds weight in story telling. A listener will have an almost physical reaction when they hear the hour dropped. For most, the only points of reference one has with the time are of the extremes.
Other times of day can be rationalized, sorted and filed away with the myriad of other happenings typical of their time slots. But for most people, 4am has a very shallow bag of experiences to pull from. Stress, exhaustion, and inebriation being the most common.
You sympathize with someone forced out of bed at 4am to make a flight, and you ache at the stamina needed when someone is retelling a long night on the town that of course, ends at 4 o’clock in the morning. The specific time in which these events take place doesn’t really matter all that much when retelling the events. Was it a 4:20 wake up? Did the late night after party wrap up around 3:40? No, of course not. It was 4am.
A few weeks ago, I had my own brush up against the mythical 4am. It was an end of summer bop in Montreal. Friends were in from out of town and needless to say, one thing snowballed onto the next. I found myself outside of a recently closed up club making loose brunch plans nobody actually believed in.
The only vehicles on the street were cabs, but I opted for the 30 min walk home to help sober myself up. Walking through the empty residential streets I was surprised by the sense of calm that washed over me. Every apartment I passed was full of sleeping Montrealer's in their warm beds. It felt as though there was nothing to do, nowhere to go but home. My mind was tired and empty. One step in front of the other.
It's no wonder why Zen monks are instructed to take there first meditation before daybreak or why so many professional athletes start their training at the crack of dawn. It's because its easier. Not a single distraction to be had.
The irony is that if you, like me, have had restless nights of mediocre sleep, the opposite feelings tend to be true. Instead of clarity, 4am represents tension, where past mistakes loop and tomorrows troubles are ruining a decent nights sleep.
The goal is to keep in center consciousness the real state of the world. Everyone is in bed, and there is nothing to do. The mind should feel as empty as a 4am stroll down a residential street.
]]>Dvarapala translates to “door guardian”. They are usually portrayed as fearsome, grotesque and purposefully intimidating giants and are believed to protect the property and their residence. The weapon of choice for a Dvarapala is a large club, and they occasionally use it as an arm rest as they stand their post.
After noticing these characters in India, they seemed to follow me on my travels through my work trips in southeast Asia. They were standing tall at temples in Bangkok and carved into wood pillars in Katmandu. My personal favorites are the Dvarapala’s of Java, Indonesia. They are massive plump figures, sitting at the gates of ancient stone temples, striking fear into anyone entering with bad intentions. India’s ancient trade routs stretched across the afro-Eurasian continent, and parts of their culture and beliefs went with them. The proliferation of Dvarapala’s is just one example of India’s massive cultural prowess for most of written history.
But as illustrated when I was entering that newly built factory, these characters are not exclusive to ancient ruins. There are stone carvings of Dvarapala’s at the entrances of Indonesian truck stops and flanking the doors of modern air-conditioned malls. They stand (or sit) as a living tradition through many parts of Asia.
It dawned on me a few weeks ago on a trip to Ottawa that this desire to embellish buildings with grotesque symbols is not isolated to the Asian sub-continent. Canada’s parliament hill, built in gothic revival style, is adorned with countless twisted faces and gargoyles. They were carved and set in place with the intent to protect. Old city hall in Toronto holds similar details.
Grotesque perched on Parliament Hill, Ottawa
The most direct representation of Dvarapala’s in western architecture would be the proliferation of lions guarding the entrances of institutional buildings. In Manitoba’s legislative building the grand staircase has two massive brass bison that politicians must walk between every day (“the ledge” as the building is known by Winnipeggers is so adorned with occult symbolism and superstition it deserves its own letter lunar letter).
From an architectural standpoint, the western world is now firmly planted in the material. We have spent the better part of the last century stripping new buildings of any animistic embellishment. I hope that as these Asian countries continue to modernize, they don’t throw away these practices as quickly as we did.
The two bison, Manny & Toba, at "The Ledge" in Winnipeg
]]>The summers were punctuated by camping trips up in the lakes and trees of the Canadian Shield. These trips as a child didn't seem to hold any cultural weight at the time. It was part of living; another thing to do. My mind hadn’t been molded to compartmentalize the experience I was having. Kids carry on with their imperfect life in another location, just with more places to explore.
Phase of Nothingness By Nobuo Sekine, 1969
A few things have changed since those childhood camping trips. Firstly, I’ve been a city dweller for the past 13 years, where shoes are almost universally mandatory. I’ve also entered the very adult world of time management and experience compartmentalization. Like all adults, my days are divided into blocks. Each life experience being given an allotted amount of time and filed with the correct category, title, description, location, and attendees.
Camping trips are a rare opportunity where its possible to briefly return to a childlike understanding of the world. As you hike further from your car your perception of time starts to slowly dissolve. A few days of sleeping in a tent and you naturally sync up to the sun. Because you are quite literally outside the entire time you have a direct relationship with the weather. A numerical read out of temperature becomes incredibly abstract. How would a specific number be helpful? You already know what the temperature is!
The same can be said for time. You may look up the time out of curiosity (or to see how close you can get by eying the angle of the sun… turns out not very close). But as you get further into the trip the time of day becomes less and less important. Meals are eaten when hungry, rest is taken when tired. Tasks are completed based on how much sun is left in the sky.
Forest of Okukuji by Nobuo Sekine, 1979
Of course, in adult life the camping trip itself fits nicely within the category of ‘vacation time’, but this fact doesn’t diminish the feeling. The feeling of simply experiencing where you are. The further I get from that access point parking lot, the slower the mind becomes. The less compartmentalization and experience sorting is going on in that adult brain of mine.
The real trick is how to pull that feeling from out of the woods. I am trained to want to block out time to allow for this, which of course completely defeats the purpose. It’s important to note that there is nothing more ‘real’ about being in nature, such as a provincial park that was somewhat arbitrarily deemed worth protecting (the general concept of a wildlife park acts as another abstraction formed by the adult world). There is no secret to presence hidden within their boarders that cannot be found on the 5th floor of an office tower, or around a dinner table with family and friends.
I suppose to be truly present it's probably best not to think too much about it.
Mother Earth By Nobuo Sekine, 1968
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As a city dweller its easy to think that we take care of trees. We decide where they grow. We line trees up to fit within our grids and trim them back when they get too rambunctious. Any saplings that shoot up are quickly mowed over. The most bazar treatment of urban trees is when we wrap their trunks in wooden protective boxes at construction sites. Of course, these safety measures are made from another tree we have determined not as important.
But city trees tend to be quite a bit smaller than their ‘wild’ cousins. Urban trees are stunted, partly from limited space for their roots but also due to the constant compacting of soil around them. Trees in city environments are also much more likely to become sick from fungal infections or insect infestations.
It turns out trees are intensely social beings. Trees in the city have limited to no social networks. Forested trees form relationships through root connections in the soil. Forests can sense and communicate potential threats to each other, allowing them to put up defenses before the oncoming threat arrives. Urban trees are islands, not being able to reach one another to form these relationships.
Another main difference between urban and forested trees is the time they take to grow. Urban trees shoot up at lightning speeds, some species of trees planted in cities can reach full height only fifty to one hundred years after planting. This is incredibly quick compared to the forest. These fast-growing trees are much weaker because of it. Ice, heavy snows, and rolling thunderstorms easily take down urban tree branches or push trees over all entirely.
Some saplings in a forest can hover around ten to twenty feet for their first fifty years of life. They are just barely surviving off what little sunlight reaches the forest floor. What keeps them alive is their network under the soil. Larger trees share a little bit of energy to these saplings to keep them going. And they wait, growing denser, stronger, and more resilient for that specific location on the forest floor. Only the saplings that are most suitable for their spot in the woods end up surviving. If they are lucky and live long enough, one of the older trees in their vicinity will fall over. It’s then a mad dash to take its place in the canopy.
This process of succession is what gives old growth trees such long and healthy lives. Slow growth produces saplings that survive because they were best suited for that specific spot. Second, the tree’s community connections kept it going all those years. Lastly, and most importantly, the tree was just lucky to be in the right spot at the right time.
Growing a business is a lot like the life of a tree. Learn how to survive in your niche, build a community, and be really damn lucky.
Blue is the colour of humanity. It seems to absorb any emotion we can throw at it. It’s the colour of both despair and serenity. It’s considered a cool colour, meaning the hue recedes from our view. We fall into it, chase after it, and most of the time we don’t see it at all.
Blue was the last colour we discovered and named. Many languages still use the same word for both blue and green. For early cultures it went unnamed altogether. The ancient Greeks didn’t recognize it as its own hue, treating it as a shade of grey. In Homer’s writings he could only refer to the sea as ‘dark’.
This lateness of recognition is due to the colour being both omnipresent and historically difficult to replicate. It’s one of the rarest colours in nature, showing up in only handful of birds and flowers. Up until recent chemical breakthroughs, creating rich blue paints or dyes was exclusive to small pockets around the world. Blue was a colour we held for the gods; Jupiter, Krishna, Odin, and the colour of Mary’s cloak. Blue is other-worldly and just beyond our grasp.
Blue represents a music genre that is the epitome of sadness. At the same time it's the worlds preferred colour (two out of five people say their favorite colour is blue). People connect to the songs of blues musicians not because of its sadness but its beauty and soul.
The summer blues are not the crashes, but the waves. There will be highs and lows. You can’t stop the waves from coming, might as well learn to surf.
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I’m happy to announce my new studio is located in unit 206 at 5520 Rue Chabot, Montreal. As you can see from the photos below there is quite a bit of work to do. Over the next few months, I'll be installing warehouse shelving and building a design office along the back North facing windows.
Kiss with Honda, Alex Colville, 1989
One of the most coveted consumer items, the car is an expression of glamour, success, of "driving in the fast lane," of having "arrived." Wherever you are right now, chances are you're not more than a stones-throw away from breaking a car windshield.
The design of the first vehicles , or motor carriages as they were called, were exactly that; a horse drawn carriage with an engine. But during the second industrial revolution car design started to come into its own. The engine was placed at the front, the accelerator and breaks were delegated to the feet, and the steering wheel became standard.
In the post war era a new type of car slowly started to emerged, driven by the concept that your ride should reflect your identity. Consumer culture had arrived, putting aesthetic evolution into high gear. Year after year new models in slightly different shapes and sizes rolled off the assembly lines with hopes of capturing new buyers. Like a game of broken telephone, through this repetition design details became obscured, forming the car shapes we see on the road today.
There is one type of vehicle which can temporarily escape this cycle of annual obsolescence: fleets of service vehicles. The taxi of Hong Kong, the auto rickshaw of South Asia, and the school busses of North America are three of my favorite vehicle designs. Each one exemplifies an easily recognizable form that isn’t an attempt to represent any one person.
Take the taxis of Hong Kong. The city has been using a sedan built by Toyota specifically for taxi fleets for the last 27 years. The design itself is rather unremarkable, but what is amazing is the length it was in production. Originally rolling onto the tight streets of Hong Kong in 1995, the design was in continual production till 2017. The look interesting primarily because they haven’t changed. There was no need to change them. The sedan worked well, was reliable and was easy to fix and replace parts (because it was still in production!). This taxi design from the 90’s formed a unique feel for an entire city simply by staying put.
An example of an EV 'Skateboard'
Once this shift happens owning a vehicle would gradually become less and less logical for many. More auto manufacturers would start focusing on selling to fleet buyers. They would then start designing vehicles not for what people think themselves to be but what the vehicles are being used for. Combine this with the open ended ‘skateboard’ EV platform and we will quickly see designs that look nothing like what vehicles are today. Commuter office vans and overnight highway sleeper cars could be just around the corner. Each design tailored the type of transit you need at that specific time. These fleets would only change if it increased function or lasted longer. Like taxi’s, school busses and rikshaws, some of these vehicles could become recognizable characters in our communities through their design, their omnipresence, and our collective memories of using them.
The dominance of cars designed to reflect the brand of their owners could come to an end. The release of this financial burden of ownership will allow people to view cars for what they are, modes of transport. With this change, our society may not only be more efficient and convenient, but could end up looking a lot more interesting in the process.
Edward Burtynsky, Container Ports 8, Racine Port Montreal, 2001
My first rug collection started with a trip to visit rug producers in January 2020. Halfway through developing the collection, COVID-19 hit.
It quickly became clear that for many in India the cure was worse than the disease.With a lack of government support during lockdowns and high levels of unemployment, Spring of 2020 was tough for many. People needed to get back to work, and so they did. To my surprise, final samples were finished, and my first rug order was completed by August 2020.
Getting the rugs to Canada was a whole other kettle of fish. Like most offshore products, my rugs are transported in shipping containers. Government lockdowns in early COVID would close shipping ports at different times around the world. In certain ports, boats were waiting in droves to unload while in other ports product was piling up to be loaded but with no boats in sight.
In a response to the pandemic many companies canceled orders. This exacerbated the problem. Demand for these vessels completely dropped off; making these idling behemoths extremely costly, and in some cases even causing shipping companies to sell some of their fleets for scrap metal.
Edward Burtynsky, Shipbreaking #9, Chittagong, Bangladesh 2000
This is the backdrop for my rugs to start their journey from halfway around the world. Their itinerary was as follows:
However, when it was go time, there was no container or boat to transport the rugs. Everything was booked up and backed up. My rugs sat in a warehouse outside of Mumbai for a month waiting to get a spot in a container and ship. When they finally got to Greece they had to stay there for an extended layover, waiting on the backed-up Montreal port. The trip was three times longer than originally quoted. My following order over the summer saw similar wait times, and dealt with additional backups caused by the infamous Evergreen Suez Canal blockage.
My new shipments will be faced with a slightly different problem. In countries where government spending helped citizens stay afloat combined with the middle and upper class’s saving instead of spending during lockdowns, many people find themselves with a little extra cash. This has created a massive spending spree, supercharging the demand for imports. Unfortunately, many ports are still backed up and containers are still in the wrong places. This means that shipping costs are at an all time high.
Shipping containers waiting to unload off the coast of Los Angeles
So what’s next? We could be looking at further shipping delays and high prices until mid 2022. We will likely see more products in shops out of stock for months to come. It will take time, but these issues will slowly get sorted out. However, it is undeniable that the pandemic has altered international trade. Don’t worry, nobody needs to start stocking their bomb shelters to live through the impending toilet paper shortage. What this means is that companies are starting to rethink their supply chains, and many of them will make changes for the better.
Some companies will start bringing certain parts of production back closer to home, investing in local factories and automating processes once completed by cheap labor in other countries. But many companies will continue to make products all around the world for a long list of legitimate reasons. World trade will continue to rely on the efficient and cost-effective container ship industry. The future holds more production everywhere.
I believe the real shake up is for time sensitive products like seasonal or consumable goods as well as critical products like computer chips and batteries. This is where innovation and rejigging will be most needed.
Chris Jordan, Container Yard No. 1, Seattle 2003,.
As for me, I am one of the lucky ones. The rug industry is not known for its innovation. I am working within a tradition that predates much of written history. My business is based on partnering with crafts people whose skills and output are not matched anywhere within Canada. India continues to be one of the best places in the world for rug weaving.
I also have time on my side. The intention of this company is to make products that last for generations, not seasons. So, if I need to wait a few more weeks for rugs to arrive then so be it! I’ll plan accordingly. I’m happy to say I'm fully stocked in all rugs, and I’ll keep working to stay that way.
If you own a rug made of PVC, Polyester, Acrylic, or any other plastic fibre, the answer is no, you can't digest your rug. You should not be taking a bite out of your plastic soda bottle, you should remove the cling wrap from your leftovers before microwaving, and you should not be breathing in polyester fibres. If the plastic rug has recycled material it may also be slowly off-gassing in your home, leading to even worse air quality.
In contrast, rugs made from natural fibres such as wool, cotton, and linen are all able to break down naturally in your body.
India has become the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic. With record breaking daily infections, despite extremely low testing rates, it is difficult to fully grasp the scale of India’s second wave. One thing is certain, India is in a crisis and their healthcare system is completely overwhelmed.
I’ve been speaking with my partners in India about how to help the region where I produce my product. I have been put in contact with Ramkrishna Sewashram Hospital, a non-profit NGO based in Mirzapur, India. Mirzapur and the surrounding region is where a large portion of my rugs are produced. This small hospital has quickly pivoted to treat COVID-19, but they are in dire need of supplies and support to keep up with the flow of patients.
You can help by donating directly to organizations on the ground in India right now.
Khalsa Aid is an NGO that provides humanitarian aid in disaster areas and civil conflict zones around the world. They are currently supporting medical networks across India and working on the ground to assist COVID-19 patients.