The Mending Lounge
For a weekend in May 2016, local artists and designers gathered to explore mending through experimentation and signature styles. This pop-up public event took place at the storefront gallery of Craft Ontario on Toronto's busy Queen Street West. It took a participatory approach with a DJ and round tables welcoming visitors to bring their own mending, or observe and learn through creative know-how and homegrown flare.
The Mending Lounge was curated by Kathryn Walter and Janna Heimstra, who selected the participating artists to reflect a range of ways to mend. Through art, design, poetry and politics, the participants inspired a celebratory spirit that resonated with the audience as they revelled in the act of making the old new again.
One Minute Videos with participants
Hazel Meyer
Muscle Panic
Dorie Millerson
Mending with holes
Mending was once a part of everyday life before an era of unfettered economic growth forced the textile industry offshore and ushered in a new age of fast fashion. As the price of apparel goes down, labour abuses and environmental degradation increases. The tragic irony is that while mending is fading from public consciousness in Canada and United States, many people overseas and out of site spend their days in deplorable conditions, sewing cheap, new clothing for the North American market.
Mend more, buy less!
