With EartHand in residence at Trillium North Park, partnering with the Vancouver Park Board, our community is setting a new precedent in the management of urban parks. This is one of the first city parks in North America where community members can participate in making projects using materials gathered and processed right in the park itself!

Strathcona is a rich and diverse area with a very high concentration of artists and mavericks, bucking the main stream trends and cultivating all kinds of art and liveliness in the neighbourhood. To honour that spirit and make Trillium Park more rich and welcoming, our projects on site have been enhancing the infrastructure with things like the EarthLoom and the Pollinator House.  This summer, with funding from the Vancouver Park Board’s Neighbourhood Matching Fund, artists David Gowman, Melodie Flook, and Arlin ffrench have been leading aspects of the ‘Weaving Our Social Fabric’Project, so-called because it brings together the carvers, spinners and gardeners who have been some of our most enthusiastic program supporters over the past few years.

David Gowman has been leading the design and carving of a custom set of Rain Catchers to channel rainwater from the roofs of our containers to a rain barrel in the dye garden; Melodie Flook has been teaching rope-making far and wide, to collect enough rope so that our chain link fences can become transformed and softened by a crocheted installation; and Arlin ffrench has been designing and building a wall-mounted walking wheel — a kind of spinning wheel — that the spinners in the crowd will be lining up to try when it’s unveiled on October 1st.

This is an extraordinarily rich experience for us and we look forward to the years to come.

WEAVING OUR SOCIAL FABRIC – Final Celebration – Trillium North Park, corner of Malkin & Thornton – 1-4pm Saturday October 1st