A NEW
RESOURCEFULNESS

by Christa Clay
BA, the University of Texas at Austin, 2017

A critical and process documentation thesis paper submitted in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of Master of Design.
Emily Carr University of Art & Design 2022
© Christa Clay, 2022

Abstract & Key Terms

This thesis reflects on our relationships to the materials and objects
that we are surrounded with, the agency they carry, as well as the
responsibility we have to the places and communities we inhabit.
This context makes way for a narrative on localization, circularity,
and resiliency. A New Resourcefulness offers auto-ethnography
woven throughout theory and design practice, as experienced in
British Columbia, Canada.

material, place, responsibility, redirective practices, localization,
community, circularity

This thesis is written in APA (American Psychological Association) Style
7th edition.
Typeset in Tw Cen MT, Calluna, and Callibri.
© Christa Clay

01

02

Acknowledgements

Thank you to my peers and mentors, who were instrumental in
the progression of this work, and in making two years of hybrid inperson/online grad school not only tolerable, but extraordinary.
To Keith Doyle, my supervisor, for your encouragement and support,
and always ensuring that making and fun were never sidelined.
To my collegue and dear friend, Chiara Schmitt, for all of the lessons
learned, experiments had, and memories made. I can’t imagine what
this work would have been without you.
To my community in British Columbia, who have unsparingly shared
with me lifetimes worth of local knowledge and history, and for
helping make this place home.
To all my family in Texas, especially my parents, Tom & Leslie Clay,
for unwavering encouragement, even throughout a global pandemic
keeping us apart.
T0 my life partner and constant collaborator, Kevin Isherwood, for
teaching, supporting, and inspiring me with boundless patience and
generosity.

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04

Contents

Abstract & Key Terms
Acknowledgements
Positionality
Land Acknowledgement
Definitions
Methodology

01
03
06
11
12
14

Introduction

16

On Materiality
Object and Material Agency
woodturning
Material Ethics & Responsibility
Place-Based Responsibility
fish leather
Invasive Species as Resource
Scotch broom
Redirective Practices towards Material Futures
Resilient Communities
local clay

24
28
31
36
40
44
48
56
64
70
74

Conclusion
A Final Reflection

76
82

References
Appendix

84
88

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Positionality 1

“Because lived experience is central to my writing
and to the subject of place.” (Lippard, 1998, p.5)

The research featured in this thesis begins with my entry into design
studies and is greatly informed by my practice as I have come to
know it since I have landed in Canada. I came to this work through
explorations of place and material, a means of wayfinding in my
new home of British Columbia (B.C.) beginning in 2018. Efforts
to better understand my relationship and responsibilities to this
rich and complex landscape initially took the form of engaging
with local materials I had access to around me. I gained a sense
of groundedness to and awareness of my new home through the
creation and sharing of the final artifacts made. They carried with
them that which is difficult to find in physical forms – a sense of
place1 and belonging.
This practice matured in the company of the Place-Based Graduate
Collective,2 which took shape through the coordination and
direction of Laura Kozak and Jean Chisolm at Emily Carr University,
and introduced me to the concept of place-based responsibility.3
This introduction weighed heavily on me, and continues to affect
1 Lucy Lippard offers a thoughtful foray into the concept and cliche of a ‘sense
of place’ as a sense of intellectual property, a way for nonbelongers to belong,
momentarily all the while offering them, as an invaluable cultural and social
tool, much needed connections to nature and sometimes cultures otherwise not
considered to be their own (Lippard,1996, p. 33)
2 The Place-Based Collective is a group of design & art students coordinated by
Laura Kozak and Jean Chisolm at Emily Carr startimg in 2021. This group met
weekly to discuss a series of roundtables that occurred in the Spring of 2021, and
built relationships that ultimately culminated in a series of projects and partnerships
founded on the notion of place-based responsibility, inluding pl.lab (p,48-63)
3 Place-based responsibility can be understood as processes that centre relationships
with community and place (Kozak & Chisholm, 2021)

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my design practice as well as how I navigate my way around the
spaces I inhabit. It immersed me into an acute awareness of my
surroundings, and the necessary steps of slowing down, asking
questions, listening to, and coming alongside our community
members. It encourages a rich and flexible practice that embeds
flexibility, collaboration, and generosity into its fabric, allowing for
human and non-human stakeholders to pass back and forth, leaving
behind only what they wish to be shared. It enabled me to reimagine
my understanding of the local from a perspective more attuned to
my upbringing in the southern U.S. to that of a coastal rainforest,
abundant with unique knowledge, life, and responsibilities. It has
encouraged me to read more, listen closely, act wisely, and take
ownership of my role and responsibilities as a designer within this
specific community and landscape.
It is from this posture I explore these sentiments within the bounds
of a research-through-design practice, and continue to do so. That I
am able to start with a material of place as a speculative subject, and
then to reinforce/articulate that work through supporting theory,
proves that alternative methodologies not only work, but yield an
intrinsically rich and relational practice. Making as research rather
than research for making.
Cultures of robust craft-centric communities, rich with generational
material intelligence and making practice, is present across the
world. Fed by the fire of industrialization and globalization, art and
crafted objects, previously regionally confined to their indigenous

07

places and nearby trade routes, proliferated (Dadi, 2003). This
culture of craft precedes me and will outlast me, as an integral
part of cultures and economies worldwide. It is because of the
generational dissemination of craft knowledge, skill, and tradition
across the globe, that my hands and mind are capable of practicing
craft as I know it.
Through its expansive and emotional history, an overwhelmingly
abundant knowledge base has been cultivated in this landscape
of B.C.. There are lessons to be learned by all who seek a greater
understanding of what living in this place means. Living here
is knowing those pieces of knowledge, though sometimes they
might seem controversial or inconvenient. These include, but are
certainly not limited to, conversations around decolonization and
reconciliation with First Nations communities, the Indigenous
people of this land. This is an immense responsibility, to seek to
learn and engage with these truths. During which we can begin to
better understand the local implications for the dominant systems
of industry and production, the import economy and resource
extraction, policy and advocacy. We begin to understand how our
efforts might be reoriented to place, if and when we can collectively
become more responsible to and for it.

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09

10

Land Acknowledgement

My time in academia has exposed me to countless land
acknowledgements. Some short, scripted, rehearsed – some longer,
reflective, urgent. These acknowledgments are empty words
without the accountability of lasting change behind them. Through
my conversations surrounding these acknowledgements with
Indigenous and non-Indigenous acquaintances, I have settled here:
The place from which this research was fostered and fed is stewarded
by its traditional and ancestral inhabitants, the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh
(Squamish), Səl ̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh), xʷməθkʷəy̓əm
(Musqueam), Coast Salish nations. This stewardship has been
irrevocably transformed due to the violent colonization that stripped
the landscape of its resources, culture, and identity, to make way
for white settler communities to establish – but it is stewardship
that persists to this day. I acknowledge my responsibility as a new
inhabitant of this landscape to think critically about where I go from
here in respect to Indigenous knowledge and cultural practices. It
is my responsibility to learn of and know the history of this place
intimately, before I can learn how to best be responsible for it.
What follows, as an entry point into this journey, is a way of living
that assumes a place-based responsibility. This means considering
how we are already a part of local systems through our engagements
with the material world that surrounds us, and how we can be
continuously conscious, critical, and intentional with what their
implications are.

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Definitions

Agency: the capacity of someone or something to act, create
intervention, or influence
Circular Economy: retains and recovers as much value as possible
from resources by reusing, repairing, refurbishing, remanufacturing,
repurposing, or recycling products and materials, keeping as much
material as possible in circulation within a given environment
Design: “a creative activity whose aim is to establish the multifaceted qualities of objects, processes, services and their systems
in whole life-cycles” (as cited in Manzini, 2006, p.1); the act of
deliberately moving from an existing situation to a preferred one
(Fuad-Luke, 2009)
Embodied: Having physical form, rather than digital or mental, to
give an idea or feeling an expression, tangible, or visible; embodied
knowledge is learned through the body’s knowledge of how to act
instinctively
Localization: the process of situating industries and businesses
within a defined geographic area in which the surrounding
communities have greater authority and autonomy over their input/
output of resources, infrastructure, and labour
Materiality: a quality possessed by something that has a place in the
physical world

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Material Intelligence: “a deep understanding of the material world
around us, an ability to read that material environment, and the
know-how to give it new form.” (Adamson, 2019, p.4)
Place-Based Design: “informed by a deep understanding of local
ecosystems and culture,” and should ideally amplify and connect
to local perspectives and grassroots efforts (Irwin et al., 2015, p. 10)
Practice: direct experience, embodiment, and a presence of being
and becoming – the application of knowledge or skill to realize some
kind of end (Fry, 2009)
Practice-Based Design Research: “an activity that requires our
engagement with ideas; to set ourselves the task of questioning,
clarifying, challenging, proposing and developing new perspectives.”
(as cited in Walker, 2011 p.25)
Redirective Practice: “a new kind of (design) leadership, underpinned
by a combination of creating new (and gathering old) knowledge
directed at advancing means of sustain-ability while also politically
contesting the unsustainable status quo.” (Fry, 2009, p.57-58)
Resilience: “the system’s capacity to cope with stress and local failures
without collapsing (and to learn from the experience)”. (Manzini,
2015, p.191)

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Methodology

In order to explore and develop this research, I employ
materials harvesting and exploration, research-through-making,
interdisciplinarity, and storytelling as my primary methods.
This toolbox has taken me from conversations with community
members to the sites of harvest – to researching resource histories
and processing methods – experimentation – collaboration – trial
and error – and storytelling – in order to end up back with members
of the community. Though now with a broader audience in mind –
all those that seek connections to place and relationality with their
material surroundings.
Thus the trajectory of this research, circular by nature, acts in
service of a given place by committing from the outset to that
place of which it is a part. This intentionality is a product of the
understanding that we all carry the capacity to make a difference
where we invest our time and energy, the places of which we are all
a part. That this kind of practice, foundationally committed to place
and community, operates for causes beyond any one researcher’s self,
but rather in service of something more permanent - the land.

14

x

[image]

figure 1 / A snapshot of me at Iona Beach Park in Vancouver, B.C. March of 2022. The
park hosted a small group of us from the Place-Based Field School, to help clear plant
invasive species, and supply me and my collegue with material for our research (as
featured in p. 56-63)
Photo by Alison Boulier

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Introduction

Boiling oceanwater on a roaring wood stove and sifting ash from
the hearth of a wood-fired bread oven - it all seemed intuitive at
the time. The circumstances I’d found myself in, living in British
Columbia, set me on a different path with otherwise foreign habits
from what I’d previously known. Prawning, harvesting shellfish,
cultivating yeast, brewing beer and cider, removing invasive plant
species, and farming were not part of my upbringing in the Texas
suburbs. These opportunities came forth after I moved from the
United States to Canada in 2018. Here, I found myself wholly
invested in the possibility that a greater intimacy with the materials
around me could expedite my belongingness to this place.
Through this endeavour I learned more than I could have imagined,
through my environment, family, friends, and acquaintances
certainly, but more provocatively through a language4 discovered
through these material engagements. I found that, through them, I
could communicate with those around me in an entirely unique way.
A bowl of sea salt5 made from ocean water6 I gathered off the coast
of Piers Island was not just an off-beat alternative to table salt.
Imbued within the salt was an intention to subvert conventionality,
an acute awareness of my surroundings, and an intimacy with
process. The ash I sifted from the Francis Bread7 oven and mixed
4 The rhetoric and didactics of material language as a subject is articulately portrayed
in my colleague’s complimentary thesis (Schmitt, 2022)
5 As pictured in figure 2
6As pictured in figure 3
7 Francis Bread is a bakery I worked at in the summer of 2019, it is located on Salt
Spring Island, B.C., see figures 4-5

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into a ceramics glaze,8 was not seen for its greenish-hue, or textural
variation – but instead for the story told. It captured the time and
transition it took for the tree to be felled, bucked up into firewood,
dried, brought to the bakery, and loaded into the oven to make kin
with naturally leavened loaves (of locally milled grains) in the oven’s
hearth. From this, the resulting wood ash was finally deposited into
my bucket.9
It is because I tell the story of the ash, and offer imagery of the
resulting artifacts, that the glaze begins to take on an imbued
meaning – not only of the place from which it came, but also the
process and community of which it is inextricably linked.
The research that follows was ignited by this lens of acute awareness
to the materials and objects of place. It was fostered and fed by the
individuals I encountered through my time studying at Emily Carr,
as well as the countless inspirational words of literature, theory,
environmental advocacy, research, and prose. In an investigation of
materiality that characterizes our relationships to the materials and
objects we engage with daily, this thesis offers an example of personal
contextualization for the reader. Every human being is constantly
interacting with the material world around them, and as such each
interaction offers an opportunity. Understanding what it means
to create something as a designer, and act intentionally on what it
means for those creations to be held or pursued, is paramount.
8 As pictured in figure 7
9 As pictured in figure 6

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Across ethical and ecological bounds, this work demonstrates
alternative design and material practices that seek to subvert
unsustainable norms with redirective practices. Woven through
theory and practice, and founded upon a responsibility to place, is a
considerate proposition for conditions we must actualize in order to
foster resilient futures for generations to come.
This work is a product of this particular environment, Southwestern
British Columbia, and within the bounds of the English language,
but does not intend to remain here exclusively. It is translatable,
transversable, and able to be embedded or suited into each and every
community.

figure 2 / sea salt, 2020

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figure 3 / Satellite Channel, off the piers of Piers Island, BC, 2021

19

figure 4 / Francis Bread Bakery, Salt Spring Island, BC, Canada
photo by Meghan Carr, co-owner of Francis Bread

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figure 5 / sourdough coming out of the wood-fired oven at
Francis Bread Bakery, Salt Spring Island, BC, Canada
photo by Meghan Carr, co-owner of Francis Bread

21

figure 6 / wood ash from the oven at Francis Bread

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figure 7 / ceramic vessel glazed with the resulting wood ash

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On Materiality

“[The] ability of objects to implicitly condition human actors
becomes the primary means by which people are socialized as
human beings.” (Miller, 2006, p.6)
“Objects materialize and express otherwise immaterial or
abstract entities, organizing subjects’ perceptual experiences and
clarifying their cognitions. The very materiality of objects, there
for the knowability of otherwise abstract or otherwise invisible
structures...” (Keane, 2006, p.198)

The discipline of design, implicitly or unintentionally, interacts with
the relationality and intimacy of materiality itself (Ingold, 2011). In
order to begin this work of investigating the materiality of artifacts
and objects, we must first consider how we as humans interact with
the material world that we are of and within. It is vital to be mindful
of these materials and how their relationships might be examined
in the context of a human-centric world, and beyond to a morethan-human perspective. Materials carry the propensity to act as
“mediators, interfaces, or in-betweens” (Bush & Tiwana, 2005) to help
us understand the world around us. To not access that opportunity
is a disservice to the life of the material and all the energy that was
spent to transform it into its final form. This means to which we
access and experience these opportunities or implications afforded
by materials is personal to each one of us, much like the unique
relationships they carry the propensity to mediate.
In fact, materiality is itself subjective and lends itself to the being
that interacts with it for interpretation. We take what we want out
of a material or object. Objects themselves bring meaning based

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on their composition, their materiality, and ultimately embody our
goals (Csikszentmihalyi & Rochberg-Halton, 2012). We consciously
observe, make sense of, and absorb the sum of its parts as we see
fit, and allow its remaining properties (those that might expose
the processes by which it is imagined, designed, and ultimately
produced) to blur into the background.
To deviate from the example of a stone, as purported by Tim
Ingold10 and Stuart Walker,11 in order to exemplify that which is
considered within materiality, I want to talk about something
ubiquitous and ordinary to most – a loaf of bread. At face value,
when shopping for a loaf, texture is often considered, price as well,
and undoubtedly flavour. Enamoured by the smell and taste we
seek to unveil (or revisit), we might not question the origin of the
grains that comprise it, the harvesters and millers that processed it,
the farmers that planted the seeds, or where those seeds originated.
There, when we consciously or subconsciously do not ask or seek
to know this history, we lose the opportunity to appreciate and
offer gratitude for the labour and intention that went into the
loaf; all that went into the story behind its creation. This instance
does not mean to suggest that an appreciation of each material
interaction you have, be contemplated so exhaustively.12 It would be
difficult to get out of your house in the morning bearing the weight
10 Ingold, 2011, Ch.2 Materials Against Materiality
11 Walker, 2011, Ch.2 Sambo’s Stones
12 This reflection, and this way of thinking, is made possible due to the privilege of
choice and time. This research does not seek to exist in such a sphere of privilege,
but instead explicates how our relationships to materials and objects can ultimately
support communities of equity, resilience, and sustainability.

25

of these considerations. Though perhaps through an increased
awareness of these material relationships we carry with us, we
might notice opportunities for intervention and expansion. Every
object represents a potential social connection (Adamson, 2018).
Considering our relationships with materials as an extension of
our social selves, offers a more thoughtful and intimate navigation
of our worlds. By beginning at the foundation of materiality itself,
we might begin to unpack how a heightened consciousness and
appreciation of these relationships can play a role in our habits,
behaviors and values.
It is in the hands and minds of designers to imbue intentionality
in material choice, knowing full well that these decisions will
influence those that receive their designs, physically, virtually, or
subconsciously. That is our first responsibility and opportunity – to
be mindful, intentional, and critical of material use. Additionally,
and ideally, would be the development and implementation of a
legible, apprehensible rubric that can measure value and ethics
outside of a purely capitalistic lens to accompany designs. Beyond
that, the onus is on the entity interacting with the design – to care
enough to discover and consider these implications for themselves.

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figure 8 / the loaf
This loaf of bread was made of flour from Barton Springs Mill, outside of Austin, TX,
and True Grain Mill, located in the Cowichan Valley, BC. The salt that seasoned the
loaf was made by me, from the Satellite Channel in B.C. (as pictured in figure 2, p.18)
The water was from Vancouver, out of my kitchen tap.
This loaf was made for my application to this program, the first contribution to my
first official portfolio, and was the inauguration to my investigations of place-based
materials and object agency. I knew that these ingredients held embedded notions of
place, and sought to better understand how that story can not only be told, but carry a
greater service. To be a champion of a place, and all those that contributed to its form.

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Object and Material Agency

“We make things out of materials. Then we use them, in ways
that bring us into intimate contact with their qualities. These
objects in use both prompt and air our search for knowledge; we
learn from the material landscape around us, and that, in turn,
informs us how we make things.” (Adamson, 2019, p.9)

Look around you wherever you are reading right now, and focus
on an object around you that reminds you of a place. It can be
any object made by any material, made from any kind of means.
Remember how you came to have this artifact.
Objects, and the materials that comprise them, carry within them
stories. What story is told by the object you selected? This agency
might be imbued within them through your personal experience
with them, or they might seem imposed on the object by its maker
or environment. Beyond the capacity of the object to tell that story,
of how you came to have it, is its origin story. How exceptional or
mundane that part of the story is, depending on who gave it to you,
if you bought it for yourself, if you know the maker, or if you have
no idea how or where it came to be, evokes something. Some objects
more than others evoke connection and intention, those of place, of
memory, of significance.
Our ability to ‘see’ these invisible histories is influenced by our
awareness of the effects of its production and ultimately its
implications on the natural environment – how it influences
humans (including ourselves), as well as how we perceive it sensorily
(Walker, 2011). These ethical understandings ultimately influence
our own well-being as well as the well-being of the communities we

28

are a part of.
Design research that focuses on our human relationships to objects
tends to favour those located within the domestic sphere (Miller,
2021) (Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly, and Eugene Halton, 2012), as it is
a pervasively relatable context and are naturally sites that reflect
our priorities and values. That does not mean that the objects we
engage with outside the home do not carry the same propensity for
representation. Our exposure to the material world is vast and everchanging, only scratching the surface with what lives in the space we
call home. Beyond the familiar, curated zones of the domestic, must
we apply theories on materiality and material culture. The food we
eat, clothes we wear, transportation vehicles we possess, and tools
we use, are all potential subjects of investigation when observing the
comprehensive arena of materiality. They are all exemplary of who
we are and what we prioritize, if they could all speak, what would
they say?
“Thus, the process of creating the object and object itself
both serve to inform the discussion and throw light on the
relationship between functional objects, sustainability and deeper
considerations of personal meaning and fulfillment.” (Walker,
2011, p.54)

Our modern relationships to materials and objects are not that
of our ancestors. Not more than two generations back from my
own, material intelligence assumed a unique role as it reflected our
success in life, in the economy, and even in our interactions with
the natural world – to the point of survival (Adamson, 2019). Soetsu

29

Yanagi, the father of the Japanese folk craft movement once said:
“They may simply be things, but who is to say that they don’t have
a heart?...They are rooted in the earth, deeply tied to the earthly
life of honest, hardworking people...The world of utility and the
world of beauty are not separate realms. Who is to say that spirit
and matter are not one?” (Yanagi, 1933:2017, p.35).

He envisions a return to the world where all everyday objects
are beautiful, contributing to a greater collective appreciation
of utilitarian artistry. This beauty is portrayed not through the
fluctuating spectrum of subjective aesthetics, but indeed because
they are functional, simply designed, handmade, accessible to the
masses, and durable. His relationship to objects is that of reverence
for use as well as the “practical benefit that it affords,” (Walker, 2011,
p.164).
This way of living, in which we only bring objects into our lives and
homes that we consider being useful and believe to be beautiful,13
does not have to reside in books or be cast away as nostalgic
romanticism – but instead has much to teach current generations.
As consumers of food, materials, content, and culture, we are what
we consume.
“We live in a world that is increasingly defined by commodities
rather than place. What results from these technological patterns
is the conversion of things, such as an ecosystem, and practices…,
into commodities that are stripped of sinuous connection with
social and natural processes.” (Higgs, 2006, p.12)
13 Famously first purported by designer and craftsman William Morris in 1880

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figure 9 / turning bowls
I began woodturning to get away from emails and found a beautiful means of amplifying the
story of a piece of wood. The flashing of maple, spalting of arbutus, tightness of old-growth
grain, all carry tales of the cost of living, surviving, falling, and returning to the earth, or
attempting to. The means to which artists and designers can not only understand these
characteristics of wood but amplify them, offers a heightened opportunity for meaningmaking and storytelling of history and place.

31

As Lippard’s artists, presented in her seminal work The Lure of the
Local, seek to capture special qualities of place in their work, that
which she designates is “embedded in everyday life,” (Lippard, 1997), so
too can the objects and systems of designers. This amplification of
imbued regionalism offers more than an experience of a given place
at face value, but an urgent glimpse of intimacy – an invitation to be
in community with the place (Leopold, 1949), aware of what it needs,
and how we can participate in that process.
To consider these ideals in the context of North American urban
communities, where this research primarily resides, means to
contextualize them for what they have come to be – luxury. The
accessibility of handmade, local, and durable things, is at large finite
in urban communities. Why should these more thoughtfully crafted
and lasting artifacts be available only to those with the disposable
income to afford it? In short, they shouldn’t. We have yet to find
a solution that breaks down the systems of wealth inequality and
unrestrained consumption of the (North American) masses in order
to tackle this dilemma. Undoubtedly, there is no one solution. There
are countless. Designers must ask the question, ‘Where can we even
begin?’ We begin in the fields of practice and communities in which
we live – where we can make the most impact – making the extra
effort to invest in redirective practices that serve a more equitable
and resilient future.
And we refuse to design anything that does otherwise.

32

33

figure 10-11 / spalted pieced of arbutus wood woodturned by me, not always going
according to plan. The spalting in the wood means the wood has begun the process of
decomposition, it captures the wood at a very specific moment, when the pigment begins
to fade intermittently, spreading and marbling the visable texture. Arbutus is a hardwood,
and the spalting renders it more delicate to work with, a reminder that we must be
responsive and adaptable to the boundaries of the material.

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figure 12 / Piers Island, B.C., a section of forest where an
arbutus tree was taken down by a neighbour, before it
was milled and broken up to make its way into my hands.
There are still a couple standing in the background of the
image, one diagonally making its way to the light. This
wood is often used for firewood as it burns slow, but its
a remarkably charismatic wood, warping and twisting,
creating the conditions for anyone working with it to act
slowly, intentionally, coaxing out forms reminicent of the
tree’s organic, original patterns.
Photo taken by
Kevin Isherwood

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Material Ethics & Responsibility

“As designers, our actions have influence and the decisions we
make have consequences — the language we use, the energy
we pour into community and equity, the materials we choose.
Inevitably, we design conditions. “ (Clay & Schmitt, 2022,
Appendix, p. 85)
“Given this degree of freedom, designers have to adopt some
criteria for choice and on this basis choose what, in their view, is
better to do. That is, given that ethics is defined as dealing with
“what is good and bad, right and wrong”, they have to make
ethical choices.” (Manzini, 2006, p.9)

Implicit in this work is an awareness and investigation of ethical
responsibility in design and material practice, particularly in the
context of our relationships to the natural world. The debate over
the onus of design’s implications on their eventual users/participants
is both extensive and undeniable (Dilnot, 2014) and offers a reminder
that designers must orient practices ethically, responsibly, and
intentionally.
Though seldom do designers dream of leading an unethical practice,
many are those who knowingly practice as such, but plead ignorance
or blatant disregard. Current systems of design, production, and
consumption14 have bred a culture of convenience (such as that of
fast fashion) where it is often preferred not to know the whole story
of a design’s actual development at risk of assuming responsibility
for the conditions its existence consequently designs – “what will
that which has been designed design?” (Fry, 2009). As well as for whom
14 “It is significant that studies of so-called material culture have focused
overwhelmingly on processes of consumption rather than production.” (Miller 1995,
1998:11)

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we are designing, we have to know the implications for the ‘in/visible
hands’ (Adisa-Ferrar, 2019) that will make them. Those that profit
from the design’s manufacture or implementation, or the systems of
caste and inequality it might perpetuate.
[...] “I was told it was invisible hands
Pushing needles through fibers picked by humans
whose lives were and are seen as disposable
Pulling the thread towards liberation
Hoping to stitch a better future for their children
Not the children who will perish in the same position as them
But their children’s children’s children
who will hopefully emerge wounded, but free from this current
system
[…]
I read it was invisible hands who allowed me to lead the life I live
But these people are not invisible, they are overlooked.” [...]
(Adisa - Ferrar, 2019, In/Visible Hands)

As we all carry unique intentions and interpretations of what is
right or useful to contribute to the world, we should yet consider
that at any point that we might be wrong – ensuring space for new
possibilities and perspectives to infiltrate. Furthermore, we must
insist that the process of ideation and prototyping be transparent,
participatory, and flexible. This ensures that we think outside of our
own experience, context, individual consequences (or lack thereof)
and actively participate within the social processes and conditions
we are designing for.

37

“To treat the natural world ethically means loving and respecting
it for its own sake, not just ours; and unless more of us do so more
often, not only will we suffer more but we will destroy many more
others who are themselves blameless,” (Curry, 2001, p.1).
“That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but
that land is to be loved and respected is an extension of ethics.”
(Leopold, 1949, p.viii)

Ecological design15 joins science and the practical arts with ethics,
politics, and economics (Orr, 2002). It supports the idea that
we cannot design for nature, or even with nature, without an
“integration with living processes” (St. Pierre, 2019, p.99).
This way of orienting (or redirecting) practice ethically is not meant
to follow a series of rules, but instead provide a particular lens
from which to continue. One that is more relational and reflective.
To act ethically as a citizen of the world, and especially so as a
designer, means to own up to the reality that all of our decisions
reap consequences. Big or small, our choices matter. Through the
expression of ethical opinions while problem-solving (or designing),
unique perspectives and objectives become evident. Outsourcing
this ethical burden onto experts on environmentalism or critical
design does not render designers immune from that liability. No
one is absolved of ethical responsibility. In order to create equitable,
sustainable, and ethical communities, we first must understand and
15 Ecological design can be considered as “any form of design that minimizes
environmentally destructive impacts by integrating itself living processes” (Van der
Ryn & Cowan, 1995)

38

consider broader social, cultural, and ecological implications of our
respective practices. After all, “the ecological community forms the
ethical community,” (Curry, 2001 citing Bennet & Sylvan, 1994, p.91).
Aldo Leopold once said, in conversation of his Land Ethic, that “a
thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty
of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” (Leopold,
1949, p.225). We would do well to heed this advice, and if not at least
regard it for its cohesive and succinct candour. If that’s all there is to
it, then where did we go wrong?

39

Place-Based Responsibility

“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging
to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we
may begin to use it with love and respect.” (Leopold, 1949, p.viii)
“Design must respond to place, to the roots of a location, ‘sprung
from the land’; nature is not absent of culture.” (as cited in
Schwann, 2019, p.179).

As a product of its surrounding landscape and community, this
research is what has come to be referred to as a place-based practice.
Coming from a deep affinity to localization and circularity, this
research was further fed by the conditions at play.
A global pandemic caused a worldwide reverberation spotlighting
the value of our local economies and infrastructure. Interrupted
supply chains, workplace overhauls, and regional lockdowns kept
most of us exceptionally local, gaining an increased awareness of our
surroundings, even if only within our own neighbourhoods. This albeit extreme – example of a change in conditions, is a poignant and
timely one. Throughout its accompanying trials and tribulations, it
has generated momentum for urban dwellers to shift towards more
‘sustainable’ lifestyles. It has proven to the world that we are flexible,
responsive, and capable of change. If we so desire.
“Here the currency of choice is the capacity to care, to give
attention, to feel attention returned.” (Fletcher, 2019, p.197)

The idea that we have a responsibility to the places we inhabit is
hardly a new one, though it can’t be emphasized enough. During

40

a time of exacerbating climate change, we will need to rely on
those around us more than ever for food, materials, services, and
infrastructure. As long as we continue to operate beyond our
carrying capacity,16 we are disadvantageous to ourselves and our
communities. Efforts to strengthen local networks and circular
economies17 begin to address this disconnect, streamlining material
flows, infrastructure, and services at an accessible and communicable
scale for community members. Through this heightened sense of
awareness and connectivity to systems and networks of place, we
reinforce the notion of responsibility and neighborliness to our
respective localities.
Unintentionally, and slowly at first, our modern technology has
displaced many of our human interactions and relationships from
face-to-face interations, to digital ones. This phenomenon has been
an invaluable tool, exacerbated by the necessity of pandemic-era
social distancing and travel restrictions, though it has come at a
cost. It has created opportunities for pervasive dissociation with our
local communities, and an accompanying lack of accountability to
the landscapes we inhabit (Kozak & Chisholm, 2021). Finally, it has
culminated in a lack of place-based responsibility.
By investing ourselves and our labour into our community, we
become a part of that community (Higgs, 2003). Our communal
work is what realizes the notion of community, grounded in a place
16 A thoughtful foray into several author’s perspective on how we relate to our planet’s
carrying capacity (Farber, Chisholm, Van Oyen, & Kozak, 2021)
17 Such as the GrIIDTM (Bursey, 2020)

41

(whether it be virtual or physical.) The expression of place-based
responsibility means to name that thing we interact and engage
with when participating in community. Its articulation reinforces
that by choosing to act with or for the needs of a group of beings
beyond ourselves, we are investing in the future of that place and its
inhabitants. It is not self-serving – it is caring, nurturing. flexible,
and present.
Perhaps we take further advice from Leopold to ‘think like a
mountain,’ zooming out beyond what is directly in front of us in
order to see things at a different pace. That we see the greater
community that comprise our places, those in the soil, the sky, and
everything in between. Those that our actions also impact, though at
a rate and scale we might not always consider.
“...as the power of place is diminished and often lost, it continues
– as an absence – to define culture and identity. It also continues
– as a presence – to change the way we live.” (Lippard, 1996, p.20)

42

43

fish leather

Summer of 2021, myself and Chiara Schmitt sought to recreate
the process of creating fish leather, as was communicated during
the 2020 Fibreshed Field School at Emily Carr (Schmitt & Logan,
2022). The students of the field school experienced a semester
rich with material intelligence of regional textile processing and
unconventional (by modern standards) material use. The fish skins,
a combination of wild Pacific sockeye salmon and lingcod, was
generously donated by the butchers at Finest at Sea in Vancouver,
B.C.. As was the case with most material research we engaged with,
this partnership opened up a dialogue with the industry source (or as
close as we could get) about local and sustainable material sourcing
previously unconsidered on their end. The skins were cleaned by
myself, Chiara, and a couple of willing volunteers, and tanned with
either oil, tea, or egg yolk.

44

figure 13 / These wild-caught Pacific
lingcod and sockeye salmon skins were
generously donated by Finest at Sea
in Vancouver, BC. for the process of
making fish leather. The lingcod skins
are not sold on the fish, and are normally
discarded after removal before they are
displayed in the case. The salmon skins
were from our dinner that night.
Photo by Chiara Schmitt

figure 14 / cleaning fish skins of any
remaining flesh to prepare them for
tanning. The first steps in preparing
fish leather.
Photo by Nico Brand

45

figure 15 / several solutions were attempted in the tanning process
such as oil, tea, and egg yolk, all traditional mediums for tanning.
Photo by Chiara Schmitt

figure 16 / the skins lay out to dry in the sun
Photo by Chiara Schmitt

46

figure 17 / one piece of the resulting leather, made from lingcod skin. Fish leather has
traditional and ancestral use on the west coast of British Columbia to make coats,
shoes, and other essential goods as it is water resistant and durable.

47

Invasive Species18 as Resource

“Your hands itch to pull out invasive species18and replant the
native flowers. Your finger trembles with a wish to detonate the
explosion of an obsolete dam that would restore a salmon run.
These are antidotes to the poison of despair.” (Kimmerer, 2013,
p.339)

My first memory of Scotch broom19 is not knowing how to find
it. Living on Salt Spring Island, B.C., freshly for the summer, my
landlord hired me to help keep up the property. When tasked
with my first job, Scotch broom removal, I asked no questions.
I picked a playlist, donned gardening gloves, and marched a few
meters from the entrance. “It’s all over the lawn between the house
and the road,” he’d said. According to these directions, I was certain
it would be easy to spot – I just didn’t know what it looked like.
I must have spent half an hour before asking for help, and once
equipped with this skill, my relationship was forever altered with
the “glistening patches of gold” (Lee, 2010) found all over the region
come springtime. I now can’t help but see it everywhere – roadsides,
beaches, orchards, trails – it calls to me. Instilled in me was a strong
desire to remove it. As it was the first invasive species I learned to
identify in B.C., it became a symbol. Removing it felt like a small
act of service I could offer to my natural environment, that of
stewardship and care.
Ecological restoration and conservation efforts have led to networks
18 Invasive Species are considered species whose introduction or exacerbated spread
does, or is likely to, cause economic or environmental harm or harm to human health.
19 Scotch broom (Cytisus scoparius (L.)) is an opportunistic invasive plant species found
throughout the coastal areas of the Pacific Northwest of North America.

48

of formalized groups and committees dedicated to the eradication,
or management, of invasive flora and fauna within a specific area.
Nationally in Canada, there is the Canadian Council of Invasive
Species (CCIS), regionally, the Invasive Species Council of British
Columbia, (ISCBC), though locally, my efforts began with the Piers
Island Association’s Council for Invasive Plants. The first time I
thought of using Scotch broom as a material was after I volunteered
with this crew of dedicated community members on Piers Island, a
‘Valentine’s Day Invasive Species Massacre’ on February 14th, 2021.20
20 As pictured in figure 18

figure 18 / pulling Scotch broom on Piers Island, February 14, 2021, with a crew of
others, not pictured. Gorse, another invasive species on the island, is also pictured
here as the more spiky plant that can grow easily near broom. Gorse was also
removed this day.

49

(right) figure 19 / moving
the removed Scotch broom
to a burn pile near Biscoe
Beach.
Photo by Charlotte Young

(below) figure 20 /
the burn pile
This is a common disposal
method of broom. It is
burned before it goes to
seed, but occasionally
seeds survive burning, and
disturbed sites are prime
territory for broom to
spread. This contributed
to the opportunity of
diverting the broom to
another fate, a resource.

50

I assumed from its namesake, and bristly nature, that someone
somewhere had made brooms out of it, and some quick research
proved my hunch correct. I prototyped a small hand broom using
the long, malleable fibres bound in string, followed by another round
bound with copper wire, in hopes to see if it lived up to its namesake.
It was a success! The hand brooms proved their usefulness, on
a small, d-i-y scale,21 but the promise was then established. This
inconvenient, labour-intensive-to-remove resource, was being
contibuously removed across the region, and subsequently burned
or sent to the landfill for disposal. This early research proved that
it could be useful for something, and that it was worth a more
thorough investigation.
21 As pictured in figures 21-22

figure 21 / preparing the Scotch broom
for broom-making

figure 22 / a series of four hand brooms,
made of Scotch broom, and bound with
copper wire

51

The research that followed, fuelled by energy from my faculty and
peers, fed the concept until it became something else entirely – a lab.
pl.lab, or the place-based material lab, was co-founded by myself and
Chiara Schmitt in June 2021. The original intention of the lab was
to develop a home for local/place-based material ethics, protocols,
and research to live. We imagined a collaborative collective where
data, stories, material samples, and experimentation could be
fostered and made accessible to the Emily Carr community and
beyond; something of a materials library that was uniquely focussed
on locality, as well as the cultural and ecological implications of
material harvest and use.
“Calling it a lab from the outset was important: placing emphasis
on process over product, and encouraging an atmosphere of
questioning and experimentation over one of certainty of where
it all might lead. The key to maintaining that open structure has
been the inclusion of an ever-widening circle of collaborators, [...]”
(Strauss, 2017, p.15)

The lab has spent a considerate amount of time focusing not only on
Scotch broom, but on relationship building. This last year, in large
part due to the opportunities and visibility afforded by the return of
in-person, on-campus activities, has proven that this way of working
is growing in popularity. Chiara and I, who share studio space
with the undergraduate Industrial Design department, have been
watching more projects and practices develop from a foundation of
place-based responsibility and natural materials exploration. Our
welcome in this creative and academic environment was fostered
by faculty and evolved into our participation in class critiques and

52

courses. Even this small bridge across departments and disciplines
has fostered so many relationships and collaborations for pl.lab as
well as for the students.
Through the process of experimentation and research, the lab
decided that the most valuable work it could focus on was regarding
invasive species, namely Himilayan blackberry22 and Scotch broom.
From this foundation was an urgency to find a way that these
invasive resources could be better used for the community as they
are already being pervasively removed. As a response to historical
habits of extractivism (Parks, 2021), we thought it advantageous to
propose a material we would want to run out of.
The lab’s work with Scotch broom is detailed thoroughly in my
co-authored 2022 paper, Ecological Restoration Through Material
Practice: Invasive Species as Resource,23 where we articulate the value
and opportunities inherent in working through place-based design
to solve local problems and fulfill local material needs.24 Through the
engagement of local knowledge keepers,25 a little bit of YouTube,
material designers,26 and scientists,27 we constantly reimagine what it
looks like to design something of place, and who else should/can be
involved in the process.
22 Another aggressive invasive plant species in British Columbia
23 Located in the Appendix
24 Process images of our work transforming Scotch broom into a spinnable thread
and solid brick are illustrated in figures 23-36, p. 56-63 .
25 Sharon Kallis of Earthand Gleaners Society
26 Marnie Bowman of Franklin St. Studio
27 This research benefited from cross-collaboration with the BioProducts Institute at
the University of British Columbia.

53

“We propose a restoration-driven material practice within the
creative field and beyond that acts as a means to actively immerse
participants in the ethical discussion of human interference in
ecosystems and offer proximity as an opportune context from
which to start.” (Clay & Schmitt, 2020, Appendix)

The research and theoretical framework documented in this paper
further proves the value of collective ways of working that prioritize
place as its grounding principle. Though we might all come from
different cities, cultures, backgrounds, and practices, where we live
at any given time is an opportunity for connection and community.
The common ground we seek – to work collaboratively and solve
local problems – is literally under our feet.

54

55

Scotch broom

figure 23 / seperating
the canapula, inner
fibrous core, from
the chlorophyll layer
on Scotch broom
branches
Photo by Nico Brand

figure 24 /
mechanically
seperating the
componants of the
branches by dancing
on the plant material
on sand particles,
pulling them apart,
easing the process of
sorting and cleaning
Photo by Nico Brand

56

figure 25 / a drum
carder loaded with
Scotch broom. The
carder has a more
finite capability
topull the fibres apart
in preparation for
spinning.

figure 26 / spinning the
resulting fibres with a
drop spindle, making
twine

57

figure 27 / cleaned oyster shells donated
figure 28 / kiln-fired oyster shells, now
generously from Harbour Oyster + Bar on effectively calcium carbonate (CaCO3),
Commercial Drive in Vancouver before
or lime
being fired in the kiln

58

figure 29 / preparing
to make the bricks
Photo by
Chiara Schmitt

figure 30 / grinding
up the fired
oyster shell into
a powder (visibly
indistinguishable
from store-bought
lime)
Photo by
Chiara Schmitt

59

figure 31 / blending the Scotch broom to break it down to shorter fibre lengths
Photo by
Chiara Schmitt

60

figure 32 / materials and tools for the brick making, tile press (top left), blender (top
right), pulverized oyster shell (bottom left) and Scotch broom branches cut into ~1 in
lengths (bottom right)

61

figure 33 / filling
the tile press
with the mixture
of Scotch broom,
water, and oyster
shell
Photo by
Chiara Schmitt

figure 34 /
pressing the brick
to release excess
water and shape
the material
Photo by
Chiara Schmitt

62

Body Text Here

figure 35 / a freshly
pressed brick
Photo by
Chiara Schmitt

figure 36 / six
bricks, in the curing
process

63

Redirective Practices towards Material Futures

“Bio design, biomimicry, and biophilic design are attempts to see
design and nature differently. They represent a search… [though]
these learning spaces are constrained by mainstream design
practices that prioritize human needs, rationality, mastery, and
economic growth.” (St. Pierre, 2019, p.101)
“…design recoups its history as hope in the interests of a future
that cannot any longer be assumed but must rather be brought
carefully into being. This means that recovery of the past is the
condition for the recovery of the future. But as we re-cover for
the sake of the future we recover from it lessons we can take into
the task of reconfiguring what-is in the interests of the future.”
(Dilnot, 2014, p.64)

No longer on the precipice of a changing world, but in the midst
of one, the only choice we have is to think and act differently.
Redirecting our methodologies to prioritize investigations and
intentionality of the materials we use, as well as an understanding
of the implications for the designs themselves in their cultural,
environmental, and social contexts, will lead to a more resilient and
adaptable future.
I, thankfully, am far from the only designer in the field with the
belief that the materials we have around us are not a resource to
be exploited and extracted, but instead offer an opportunity for
alternative or unconventional material economies that are symbiotic
in nature as opposed to parasitic (Franklin & Till, 2020). For instance,
material designers worldwide are developing illuminating and
inspiring forays into the possibilities of alternative materials for the
future. From the utilisation of materials that are carbon-negative28
28 Such as the work of Tim Seibert, The Colour of Air, who is capturing carbon black
particles from the air and converting them into a fabric dye, pencil lead, and printing
ink (Solanki, 2021)

64

to repurposing those currently headed for waste streams,29 these
endeavours prove that more creative and considerate ways to
operate in coordination with our living environments as a part of our
community exist in unimaginable forms. This research is essential,
but furthermore their methodology is the most important. This way
of working has been bred from a movement of designers that choose
the path less traveled – using materials you can’t buy, materials that
must be re/discovered and tailored to accommodate the modern
context. One of the subtleties in these emergent practices is the
intention of leading with the agency of the material itself, allowing
its properties and conditions of existence lead way to the final form
rather than seeking a material to perform a given function/solution.
This encourages slow and collaborative ways of working that
ultimately converge in material expressions that extend beyond their
physical form, to the story they are now able to express.
“Raw materials must not be thought of as merely physical matter,
containing as they do the will of nature.” (Yanagi, 1933:2017, p.41)

Material driven design positions that the ‘material’ should also elicit
meaningful experiences in and beyond its utilitarian assessment.
This requires qualifying the material not only for what it is, but also
for “what it does, what it expresses to us, what it elicits from us, and
what it makes us do” (Karana et al, 2015, p.1). A means of furthering
material design promotes the spirit of resilience and adaptability,
29 Amongst the wealth of practitioners within this category of work sits Sophie
Rawley, whose practice is led by waste materials that she finds herself with (i.e. plastic,
denim, glass, and newspaper) (Franklin & Till, 2018)

65

two characteristics necessary for surviving the years we have ahead
of us. Though, a number of these projects are rather speculative
(at their proof-of-concept stage) and live in a theoretical space
lacking the subsistence and infrastructure of a more systems-based
design approach to futuring.30 In order for these designs to initiate
lasting change, scalability and sustainability have to be the starting
point – otherwise, they might exist solely in coffee table books and
museums, rather than making the change they were once fated to
facilitate.
Rebecca Burgess’ Fibershed movement, which began with her
journey to create a bioregional wardrobe comprised of materials
within her local fibreshed31 is emblematic of a dynamic and resilient
practice (Burgess & White, 2019). Her work is founded on principles
of community building, circularity, regenerative agriculture, and
regionality of resources, to name a few, while tirelessly promoting
the notion that there are other ways to adhere to the systems
of capitalism and consumption North Americans are born into.
Through her personal journey to farm indigo in California,
engrossing herself in centuries of history of her local landscapes,
while coordinating and advocating for local textile infrastructure
long ago moved overseas, she is a champion for cross-industry
collaboration. This effort is fueled by the belief that there are
more sustainable and considerate ways to clothe ourselves and our
30 The presumption and responsibility that design/designed things are directly
involved in the creation of future actions, habits, and realities.
31 A geographical landscape that gives boundaries to a natural textile resource base; a
community of farmers, weavers, spinners, dyers, designers (to name a few) committed
to textile resources within a specified bioregion

66

communities without outsourcing the environmental and social
consequences of production. And instead, telling the story of an
alternative - with a piece of cloth.
The objects that she makes, and facilitates the production of, are
made from materials forged from the land she and her community
stewards, and they are deeply representative of place. As such, they
intuitively bring people together by offering material manifestations
of place and land as an icebreaker towards a deeper engagement with
something we all use, fibre and cloth. It takes a community to build
the infrastructure and material intelligence necessary for textile
economies to function. Farmers, artisans, policymakers, industry,
and consumers, are all points of connection in the network bringing
with them the hi(stories) of their own relationships to place and
material. These networks are durable, sustainable, and impactful,
and they are key to the establishment of localized and resilient
economies. They form a rich and dependable system of processing
and production at a community scale, as they are comprised of
that same place, and as such advocate for its success through their
participation. The resulting artifacts produced are certainly objects
of place, but also of consequence. In their uniquely local way, they
exemplify an answer to how we move forward in such a sticky
system – in small ways at first, but with reckless abandon.
Rebecca’s movement has travelled beyond the California context,
across the United States and Canada, to Europe and Asia. This
global network continues its commitment to the localization of

67

resources, regenerative farming practices, and an adherence to
ethical production standards. It has fostered relationships up the
ladder to brands and designers who have agreed this is the way of the
future for the textile industry. From working closely with the Carbon
Cycle Institute32 to calculate the carbon sequestration impact these
practices have to collaborating with folks at The North Face33 to
develop a line from soil to skin with Fibreshed farmers, spinners, and
knitters, this work considers impact beyond a home-grown scale.
That this practice is translatable and expandable across industries
and borders proves that what might be considered cottage industry34
can be scaled up and out to broader communities. It confirms
that these small and niche industries are adaptable to modern
(North American) systems of consumption and convenience. Most
importantly, they prove that there is a market for it.
This research does not seek to answer the question of whether
material designers or farmers will save the world because
undoubtedly we need both. A world’s worth of problem solvers just
might figure it out.
“The groundwork for macro-transformations and for great
systemic changes is laid by micro-transformations and local
systemic discontinuities (Manzini, 2006, p.10)

32 https://www.carboncycle.org/strategic-partners/fibershed/
33 The Backyard Project, The North Face x Fibershed, 2014 (https://www.
thenorthface.com/about-us/responsibility/product/backyard.html
34 Small scale, typically home-bound businesses.

68

The work ahead of us is immense, and the only way to approach it
is in pieces. Localized, small-scale specialization and production will
provide more economic (Fleming, 2012) and ecological resilience.
This is a means of designing for sustainability (Walker, 2010), and
also designing for more immersive and ardent relationships to place.

69

Resilient Communities

“..neighborhoods and communities will be much better placed to
apply their competence and good sense than any received, largescale, standard, and imposed practice.” (Fleming, 2011, p.71)

Beyond an authentic commitment to reducing the amount
of materials we consume (Geiser, 2001), there must exist a
reimagination of how we source and process materials and
resources. Should the concept of place-based responsibility be
combined with efforts towards the circular economy, our world
would look remarkably different. . It would be markedly more
resilient, sustainable, and creative. These practices go hand in hand,
with energy towards one directly benefiting the other. By nature
this strengthens local economies through the creation of jobs
through investment in local re-skilling and production in industries
currently outsourced beyond the bounds of the community.
dramatically reducing carbon emissions currently created through
the transportation of goods and services, all the while encouraging
long-term community involvement and investment.
This proposition would be representative of David Fleming’s Lean
Economics (Fleming, 2016) – supporting the notion that a return
to localization can reconfigure our current dominant norms of
production and distribution to one that lends itself to resilience and
sustainability. Away from the systems that pushed our environment
to the brink of disaster, to one that offers alternatives such as placebased responsibility and restoration (Higgs, 2006) as pathways for
future building. One that emphasizes and relies on community.
Fleming challenges we can “do without community, but only for a
time, like holding your breath under water ....Community will need to be

70

reinvented as the defining part of human society.” (Fleming, 2011, p.72)
Design is not carried by a chaotic storm of unsustainable practices,
it has been culpable in its establishment. To that end, it must be
our mission to be “redirectively engaged” (Fry, 2019) towards real
solutions – towards a better, more resilient future. One in which we
are so immersed and enmeshed with our communities, landscapes,
and materials around us that we can’t imagine any other way to
be. One where Manzini’s creative communities in their territorial
ecologies35 have the capacity, infrastructure, and agency, to establish
economies and futures that are attuned to the conditions of culture
and place. One that can be sustained, is considerate, adaptable,
diverse, and open-minded.
Design carries the propensity to not only facilitate this transition
but act instrumentally in its evolution. We soon might have no
other choice in a world where the only constant will continue
to be change. The more we can invest now in a commitment to
localization, the more prepared we will be for what is to come.
Donning hard hats and steel-toed boots at a construction site, I
looked for clay deposits underneath cracked soil – feeling its texture
for malleability and structure – how easily it comes together. I look
to my collaborators, the site managers and my fellow clay enthusiast,
and envision a future in which we can all work together to solve our
35 The understanding of a territory as an ecosystem of places and communities. The
building or rebuilding of those places and communities in all their variety and cultural
richness therefore leads to the production of a richer, more varied ecosystem, one that
is therefore more resilient (Manzini, 2015)

71

material needs. This thoughtfulness and intention are inconvenient
for each one of us at the site, taking time out of our day and
interrupting established efficient material flows, but as such is more
impactful in its inconvenience. That we have all made a detour of
our normal process of site excavation or clay sourcing, means this
way of working is possible. We just have to be willing to do it.36

36 This work, pictured in figures 37-40, was conducted throughout a research project
funded and coordinated through Emily Carr’s Shumka Centre for Entrepreneurship.
The project, Design for Regional Resilience, partnered design students with industry
partners seeking to incorporate more circularity into their practices. This particular
collaboration, with Janaki Larsen Studio, began January 2022, and focuses on
developing a high-fire ceramic body from clay directed from construction sites in
Vancouver.

72

73

figure 37 / site clay collection on W 3rd Ave in Vancouver , BC , in partnership
with Haebler Construction

figure 38 / collected clay from a construction site on South Cambie Drive in
Vancouver, BC

74

figure 39 / local clay samples, fired to
cone 10 at Janaki Larsen Studio

figure 40 / local glaze sampling (unfired) at Janaki Larsen Studio

75

Conclusion

At a societal scale, we have become pervasively disassociated with
the material intelligence we are surrounded by every day. This
‘progress’ has occurred at the cost of disillusionment with the
diverse ecosystems that surround us (Strauss & Pais, 2017). What
once was a condition of being human - navigating the wild or
unknown material world - has been transformed by massive strides
in technology accompanied by the digital revolution. This work acts
not as a prose of nostalgia, but rather as a microphone to champion
the value of traditional skills and knowledge that has depreciated
in modern urban centers over the last two generations – those of
material intelligence, of trade skills, of survival.
The ways we activate the accompanying material agency as
designers and makers carry a propensity to act in service of our
communities and ecosystems. It is not only an opportunity but also
a responsibility that we yield. As practitioners in this community,
as well as members of this community, if we are not mindful of the
implications of our mediums and the materials we use, then that
opportunity is lost and responsibility abandoned.
The research that myself and Chiara Schmitt have been committed
to in our collaborative practice, pl.lab, provides a unique example
of a design and material practice that acts in direct service of our
natural environment. This work offers an example that the more
thoughtful and creative we are as design practitioners, the more
life and utility our efforts have beyond our own immediate reach.
Working with natural materials and materials of potential cultural

76

significance cannot be taken lightly, though that element is often
under-considered in modern systems of design and manufacturing.
When we work together as a community to source material
alternatives that we have access to in our vicinity, our patterns of
consumption and waste will alter in tandem. This causes a ripple
effect as consciously crafted, place-based objects and materials close
the loop on the life cycle of materials/products currently imported
from far away places. This is not a new idea, rather a reimagining of
an older way of living.
Previous generations did not have the same opportunities to
outsource as us, and out of necessity they made use of what
was around them. Strides in navigation, transportation, and
communication have allowed humankind to achieve much,
but it has come at a cost. The subsequent disconnection, fueled
by industrialization and globalization, has inevitably created
the conditions for fast fashion and single-use plastics, rampant
unsustainable relationships with consumption. This research is
not drawing on these examples to dwell on the problems of their
capitalistic contributions to our communities, but instead to
reinforce the value of more thoughtful relationships to the artifacts
around us. It is a tempting idea, to preach Adamson’s curatorial
critique on this modern condition as he champions the ideal of
having “fewer, better things” (Adamson, 2019). This research, though
aligned with this notion, instead calls for a designerly commitment
and thoughtfulness to the objects we make for others to bring into
their lives and homes. That we are wary of their immediate and

77

long-term implications on the environment, human habits, and
communities.
A thoughtful awareness of materiality can be a stepping stone
to a larger behavioural transition. The choices that we make as
designers create conditions for others through their interactions
with our designs – however tangible or abstract they might be. This
responsibility must start where we are, always considering how they
may be received and to what future they are building – consciously
crafting the ways in which we want to see the world go, in the
ways that we have the capacity to do so, and how we can be more
thoughtfully involving our surrounding ecologies in our processes
(Orr, 2002).
“Design can find the best fit between economic viability, ethical
and cultural acceptability, and ecological truth,” (Fuak–Luke,
2009, p.xxi).

This is where craftspeople, makers, and material designers practicing
redirective design are establishing revolutionary work. The more
that this work is communicated, adopted, and implemented, the
more likely it is to make the change it addresses. This is some of
the work ahead of us. As every idea starts with its proof-of-concept
prototypical form, the task to fully realize radical work lies in its
scalability. An application of scaling-up that does not follow in
the footsteps of our histories of resource extraction and other
contributors to the climate emergency, but a new relationship to
resource use. One that has been around since time immemorial

78

but it will certainly take some work to get it to fit the glove of our
current modern condition.

79

80

“forget design as a territory and practice
that can be laid claim to (the drive of professionalization), stop
talking to yourselves (the internal dialogue of design events),
give up on repackaging design within design (codesign) and start
talking to other people, other disciplines; broaden your gaze
(beyond the design process, design objects and design’s current
economic positioning), engage the complexity of design as a
world-shaping force and help explain it as such.’ (Fry, 2009, p.7)

81

A Final Reflection

The opportunities I had throughout this program to conduct
practice-led design research were instrumental in shaping my
foundational sense of place-based responsibility. I consider the
opportunities and process-driven activities held within these pages
to have been full of learning and unlearning yet, incredibly privileged
and biased. I continue to actively acknowledge and challenge these
biases within my design and making practice.
This work was fueled by the energy, passion, and resources
being dedicated to circularity in British Columbia. This level of
commitment is not only inspiring and emergent – it is necessary.
Implementation of circular and localized material practices
will require a shift in our modern patterns of convenience or
individuality at a systemic level. It is instrumental in our collective
response to the climate crisis and demands a renewed relationship
with the places we inhabit. It will take continual support,
commitment, and flexibility from all affected community members
to ever achieve lasting systemic change.
Working alongside champions of circularity and localization within
my community has stimulated my acute commitment to place.
This way of working demands relationality and reciprocity with the
carrying capacity of our natural and urban environments and yields
the propensity to ignite lasting change. We can act in service of this
place, in even a small way, every day, as it is so boundlessly generous
to us.

82

There are many community members whose voices and practices
have been silenced, exterminated, and left behind, those less
privileged, underrepresented minorities, and knowledge keepers of
Indigenous communities. When struggling to envision solutions
for the future, we don’t often enough look to the past, to sovereign
knowledge, to First Nations rights-holders’ embodiment of land
stewardship, to simply think beyond ourselves and begin to
fulsomely regard the land as kin. To think of history not in the
past, but in how it has transformed our present by embodying and
enabling our material intelligence, collective memory, and culture.
Holistically in my creative practice and research, I earnestly consider
this condition and what my responsibilities and requirements are
as an inhabitant of this specific landscape – a resident byproduct
of successive generations of colonization. We are all, ourselves, in
some form, complicit or directly contributing to many of the wicked
problems we now face. Now we move forward. Carrying the weight
of this history, but freed with the truth that each day we can commit
to being better, doing all that we do in a good way.
This work is living -- it is neither static nor finished -- and is sure to
continuously reveal holes, mistranslations, and detours, all in the
spirit of growth.
I make so that I understand, I gather so that I listen, I listen so that I
can speak, I move forward so that I can be.

83

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Bloomsbury Publishing.
Adisa-Ferrar, T. (2019). In/Visible Hands. In Gala: The Practice of Belonging.
(2019, October 11). Fibershed. https://fibershed.org/galas/fibershedgala-2019/
Burgess, R., & White, C. (2019). Fibershed: Growing a Movement of Farmers,
Fashion Activists, and Makers for a New Textile Economy. Chelsea Green.
Bursey, A. (2021, March). Mapping the GrIIDTM: Making Way for
Vancouver’s First Green Industrial Innovation District (GrIIDTM). https://
sustain.ubc.ca/sites/default/files/2020-096_Mapping%20the%20GrIID_
Bursey.pdf
Bush, A. A. & Tiwana, A. (2005). ‘Designing Sticky Knowledge
Networks’, Communications of the ACM, 48, 5: 67-71.
Candlin, F., & Guins, R. (2009). The Object Reader (In Sight: Visual Culture)
(1st ed.). Routledge.
Csikszentmihalyi, M., Halton, E. (2012). The Meaning of Things Domestic
Symbols and the Self. Cambridge University Press.
Dilnot, C. (2014, July 8-11). Is there an ethical role for the history of design?
Redeeming through history the possibility of a human world (Conference
Keynote Speech]. Ninth Conference of the International Committee
for Design History and Design Studies, Aveiro, Portugal. https://www.
proceedings.blucher.com.br/article-list/icdhs2014-238/list#articles
Farber, A., Chisholm, J., Van Oyen, J., & Kozak, L. (2020). Micro-Care:
Small Acts of Resilience for Living Within the Earth’s Carrying Capacity.
Vancouver, BC: Emily Carr DESIS Lab.
Fleming, D. et al. (2009). Lean Logic: A Dictionary for the Future and How
to Survive It.
Fletcher, K. (2019). Folding In. In Design and Nature: A History, In K.
Fletcher, L.S. Pierre, & M. Tham, M. Design and Nature: A Partnership (1st
ed.)(p.193-197). Routledge.
Fletcher, K., Pierre, S. L., & Tham, M. (2019). Design and Nature: A
Partnership (1st ed.). Routledge.

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Fry, T. (2009). Design futuring. University of New South Wales Press,
Sydney, 71-77.
Franklin, K., & Till, C. (2020). Radical Matter: Rethinking Materials for a
Sustainable Future (Illustrated ed.). Thames & Hudson. (Original work
published 2018)
Fuad-Luke, A. (2009). Design Activism: Beautiful Strangeness for a
Sustainable World (1st ed.). Routledge.
Geiser, K., & Commoner, B. (2001). Materials Matter: Toward a Sustainable
Materials Policy (Urban and Industrial Environments) (1st ed.). The MIT
Press.
Higgs, E. (2003). Nature by Design: People, Natural Process, and Ecological
Restoration (The MIT Press) (Illustrated ed.). The MIT Press.
Ingold, T. (2011). Being Alive: Essays on Movement, Knowledge and
Description. Routledge.
Karana, E., Barati, B., Rognoli, V., & Zeeuw van der Laan, A. (2015). Material
driven design (MDD): A method to design for material experiences.
International Journal of Design, 9(2), 35-54.
Lee, T. V. (2010). “Glistening Patches of Gold” The Environmental History of
Scotch Broom (Cytisus scoparius) on Southern Vancouver Island, 1848–1950.
BC Studies, 166, 39–54.
Leopold, A., & Kingsolver, B. (1949). A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches
Here and There (Illustrated ed.). Oxford University Press.
Lippard, L. R. (1998). The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a
Multicentred Society. (New edition). New Press.
Manzini, E. (2006). Design, ethics and sustainability. Guidelines for a
Transition Phase. Cumulus Working Papers, Nantes 16/06. Nantes Cumulus
Working Papers Publication Series G, University of Art and Design Helsinki.
Manzini, E. (2015). Design, when everybody designs : An introduction to
design for social innovation. MIT Press.
Miller, D. (2005). Materiality (Politics, History, and Culture). Duke University
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Orr, D. W. (2004). The Nature of Design. Oxford University Press.
Parks, J. (2021). The poetics of extractivism and the politics of visibility.
Textual Practice, 35(3), 353-362.
Schwann, A. (2019). The Poetics of Cultural Landscapes through Ecological
Wisdom. In K. Fletcher, L. St.Pierre, & M. Tham (Eds). Design and Nature: A
Partnership (p.179) Routledge
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Everyday Life (Cultures of Consumption Series). Berg Publishers.
Solanki, S. (2021). Why Materials Matter: Responsible Design for a Better
World. Prestel. (Original work published 2018)
Strauss, C. (2017). The Poetic Ship. In C. Strauss, & A. P. Pais (Eds). Slow
Reader: A Resource for Design Thinking and Practice. Valiz
Strauss, C., & Pais, A. P. (2017). Slow Reader: A Resource for Design Thinking
and Practice. Valiz.
St.Pierre, L. (2019). Design and Nature: A History, In K. Fletcher, L.S.
Pierre, & M. Tham, M. Design and Nature: A Partnership (1st ed.)(p.91-108).
Routledge.
Keane, W. (2006). Subjects and Objects. In C. Tilley, W. Keane, S. KuechlerFogden, M. Rowlands, & P. Spyer (Eds). Handbook of Material Culture (First
ed.)(p.197-202). SAGE Publications Ltd.
Thomas, J. (2006). Phenomenology and material culture. In C. Tilley, W.
Keane, S. Kuechler-Fogden, M. Rowlands, & P. Spyer (Eds). Handbook of
Material Culture (First ed.)(p.43-59). SAGE Publications Ltd.
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(Original work published 1933)

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87

Appendix

Ecological
Restoration
through
Material Practice

January 2022

Invasive Species as Resource
by Christa Clay & Chiara Schmitt

↘
abstract

This paper offers a perspective on design‘s potential to act in service of
ecological restoration. By investigating an invasive plant species as an
untapped material resource of our bioregion, this work illustrates an example
of how place-based material practice can benefit both our communities and
landscapes.
The practice of sourcing materials from overseas rather than making better
use of what we have available locally paired with the introduction of materials
that are ecologically foreign in our respective latitudes, acts in disservice
of a greater environmental symbiosis. Under these circumstances, we have
become blind to the capacity of unconventional resources housed in our
respective environments. This paper unpacks how reconnecting with local
materials in design and making practice can nurture our relationships to
place, communit y, and sustainabilit y.
Through explorations into material properties and opportunities of Scotch
broom (Cytisus scoparius (L.)), one of the most prolific invasive plant species
in British Columbia, this work offers an alternative to the current culture
of resource extraction and globalization of materials. The investigation
demonstrates the temporality of our resources and their implicit ethics
by proposing a material that would be advantageous to exploit, refine and
deplete. This offering presents itself alongside an increase in calls towards
localizing our footprints, reconnecting with our living environments, and
decolonization. In order to effectively investigate the breadth of its potential,
this work incorporates reflections on ecological restoration as well as
material engagements.

88

↘
acknowledgement

↘
foreword

The contents and context of the following document were conceived,
collected, and co-authored on the unceded ancestral territories of the
Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Stó:lō (Stolo), Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (TsleilWaututh) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. This work was conducted
primarily by Chiara Schmitt, originally from Germany, and Christa Clay,
originally from the United States. As a place-based inquiry, translatable
across borders, it considers not only this particular geography—but also the
pattern of our human relationships to the landscapes around the world that
have impacted us—each context carrying with it a unique set of histories,
language, cultural traditions, and responsibilities.

This writing acts in service of ecological restoration through design and
explicates an example of how material practice can support our communities
to foster more resilient and sustainable futures. The desire to reimagine our
relationships to materials and place as makers and designers instigated
the founding of pl.lab, the place-based material lab, by the co-authors of
this paper. Calling the collective endeavour a lab established the scientific
nature of exploration through process rather than working alongside certainty
towards the outcome, which contrasts habitual design practices (Strauss,
2017, p.15-16). This framework embraces a culture of engaging with people
through research, provoking imagination, and diversifying perspectives
on material practices in ways that support our local communities. This
work serves as a culmination of the process of positioning ourselves here,
grappling with our local responsibilities, and the opportunities that emerged
from this way of working.
“The modern dilemma is that we find ourselves trapped between
the growing cleverness of our science and technology and our
seeming incapacity to act wisely.” (Orr, 2004, p.29)
As designers, our actions have influence and the decisions we make have
consequences—the language we use, the energy we pour into community
and equity, the materials we choose. Inevitably, we design conditions.
Through studio and material practice, we prioritized this opportunity and
responsibility to design conditions before we knew what would come of it.
The outcomes have been fruitful, educational, and challenging. Investigating
the question of how to honour our relations to place through a material
practice that would be considerate of cultural and ecological integrity, as
discussed in part one of this paper, led pl.lab to the exploration of invasive
species as a resource, showcased with our personal practice in part two.
Scotch broom, one of B.C.’s most prolific and invasive plant species, is
presented here as an untapped material resource of our bioregion.
In light of a changing climate—socially, politically, ecologically—this research
offers a way of working well suited to flexibility. As a design research tool
and a methodology for making in a changing world, the prioritization of
responsibility and opportunity cannot be understated. It is the only reason
this research continues within the scope of this lab—and that it acts in
service of the environment in which it is inextricably linked.

89

↘
part I

Definition by Oxford

1

Languages

2

Stands as a counter-

theme and in reference
to the article „Colonizing
the imagination: Disney‘s
wilderness lodge“ in which
the authors Eric Higgs
and Jennifer Cypher
discuss the manipulation
of our perception of
nature and wilderness
through corporations. As
a stand-point we here
call for a reimagination
and disentanglement of
these colonial images.
Cypher J., Higgs E. 1997.

Restoration, by definition, describes the action of returning something
to a former owner, place, or condition through holding the intention to reestablish, renew, and revive1. While restoration pursuits to recover conditions
of the past, design practice has the abilit y to envision, mediate and initiate
alternate conditions that allow for new realities to happen (Strauss, 2017, p.
26). Those realities ought to think into the future but connect it to the past.
Creating this bridge that reconciles the unpredictable future with the
imperishable marks of our ancestors on Earth requires not only science and
technology but also diverse embodied knowledge. It asks for a collaborative
practice that works toward a common goal, joins forces, and advocates a
shared ecological ethic that puts the planet and its healing at its centre.
This eco-centric worldview allows for ecological integrit y and an ethic
that respects life on Earth (Fleming et al., 2016, Chapter 16) restores its
diversit y while preserving and nourishing human values and culture instead
of advancing their destruction. It asks for appropriate action, a shift in our
predominant relation to the natural systems and decolonization of our
imagination2.
Using the two terms restoration and design and further proposing that one
can benefit the other is based on the belief that cross-disciplinary assets
seem worthwhile to investigate. What starts with the cautious intention of
restoring ecosystems and “regenerating old and new ways to bring us closer
to natural processes” is understood as “the power and promise of ecological
restoration.”(Higgs, 2003, p.2) On the other hand, this intentionality is what
leads the discipline of design as well. Whether designing for humans, morethan-humans, or together for the earth and its needs, designers need to
be intentional about how to approach those problems to make sure they
ultimately act with accountabilit y to their true values.
Intention, no matter how focused, will not stand alone as a driving force
against ecological and cultural problems of the world. Assisting a recovery of
an ecosystem or establishing a behavioural shift are long-term endeavours
that require perseverance. Though what unites both practices—restoration
and design—is the fundamental understanding that initiation will not result in
actual implementation unless the community is involved. “Rather than burying
human agency behind a wall of ecological justifications, design acknowledges
that restoration is also and always about people working with and within
natural process.” (Higgs, 2003, p.14) Looking at restoration as a design
practice opens up the opportunity of action that goes beyond the discipline
itself and asks for collaboration and communit y engagement on a larger and
more impactful scale, believing that the ecological communit y will eventually
form the ethical communit y (Sylvan et al., 1994, p.91).
Anne Whiston Spirn wrote, ”The moment people come to a place, even as
reverent observers, they alter what they came to experience.”(Spirn, 1995,
p.94) The Earth is constantly changing. We experience day and night,
summer and winter, notice calm and storm, fire and flood, witness tides and
shifting tectonic plates, and the increasingly irrefutable effects of climate
change. As our choices will have consequences after our death, beyond our
foresight, in places that we have never been to and for species that we don’t
know (Fleming et al., 2016, Chapter 16). It is up to us, as global citizens, to
ensure these choices are in line with our values and our responsibilities not

90

only for our own sake, but for the sake of future generations.
Restoration and (ecological) design not only share intentionalit y as its
driving force, communit y engagement as its fuel and mutual values and
responsibilities as its navigation, it also shares the idea that conversation
is the key to reciprocit y and agency. Historical and cultural conditions of
an ecosystem and place need to be considered authentically in order to
act in service of Earth’s greater good. “Restoration is about restorying
place” (Higgs, 2003, p.285) and for this, stories—as of the past, present and
future—need to be told and successfully received to work towards a more
harmonious and resilient future on Earth.
Bridging the two disciplines, ecological restoration and design, allows
the imagination of one within the other while maintaining their respective
proficiencies. This cross-disciplinary approach offers the opportunit y, which
Eric Higgs describes as follows: “Ecological restoration as a design discipline
demands attention to tradition and novelt y at the same time, searching
creatively across the spectrum of the arts and sciences for the best way to
respect ecological and cultural integrit y.”(Higgs, 2003, p.279)
By respecting cultural and ecological integrit y through the act of restoring
something long-term, it is crucial to learn about the memory and history of
a place to identify which conditions we want and should restore it to. While
it seems as though the ultimate goal of restoration might be to redeem the
mistakes of our past, it can be unsettling when one ponders the question
of when exactly those mistakes began. Did they start with industrialization,
colonialism, or humanity at large? If this were a way to travel back in time,
where would we want to go in the landscape’s chronology?

3

Ecological restoration in

BC works according to
three guiding principles: to
be effective, efficient and
engaging in order to achieve
successful, inclusive and

Tendencies to ‘fix nature’ or ‘save the earth’ can be precarious as it continues
to portray humanit y as superior once again. This misinterpretation squanders
the actual intent to assist the planet’s recovery rather than execute it on
man’s own terms. It is these tendencies that turn the mission of ecological
restoration into something recalling colonialit y—something that involves
command, control and curation, revives the question of land ownership, and
manifests a worldview in which men and nature are not interdependent, but
separate from each other. These concerns were explicitly brought up in an
ethnographic study of Anishinaabe perspectives on invasive species (Reo
et al., 2018). With a worldview that sees animals and plants as belonging to
nations and having their own purposes, their teachings believe that it is the
human responsibilit y to find the reason for a species’ migration, its purpose in
a new place and the care it requires to thrive. As native and new species are
seen as equal and one or the other eventually can become invaders, such a
perspective diminishes the idea of elimination. Designers-as-restorationists
risk acting from an assumption that invasive species are inherently bad if they
do not consider the perspective of local land stewards. In light of ubiquitous
and precarious human interventions into our environment through forestry
or mining, planning the eradication of a species, even outside its ‘native’
boundary, raises the ethical question of interfering further in ecosystems.

habitual results. Every region
sets standards.

Though this time, it would claim to be cautious and with good ambition.
Ecological restoration follows certain nationwide guidelines3 to rehabilitate
damaged ecosystems, such as those struggling with soil erosion due to a

91

lack of vegetation, those that lie fallow because of missing nutrients or too
much or little sun exposure, or those that invasive species have invaded. The
latter is the case this research aims to probe its service for. As place-specific
requirements shift, these guidelines need to follow the vernacular of a given
place. Therefore, “if we actively want to engage with people in local situations
in which they do take ownership or create a different sense of belonging,
then we have to understand that the outcome may be different than the
one we had in mind.”(Strauss, 2017, p.52) An ongoing mediation between
a community and the particular ecology of a place feeds the nourishment
of a “community self-reliance” (Fletcher et al., 2019, p.49) that embraces
the uniqueness, cultural integrity, ecological responsibilities and emotional
heritage inherent in localism.
The ecological consequences of globalization, such as resource scarcity,
extractivism (Parks, 2021) exploitation, and climate change, raises the
question of how much we value our planet. As a response, implementing the
idea of “restorying” a place offers a new understanding and appreciation
of locality. This methodology identifies the possibilities and offers of our
immediate bioregion to meet the significant need for carbon-neutral or
negative materials and sustainable living through the cultivation of new
engagements with materiality.
We propose a restoration-driven material practice that acts as a means to
actively immerse participants in the ethical discussion of human interference
in ecosystems and offer proximity as an opportune context from which to
start.

92

↘
part II

Our research with the invasive plant species Scotch broom is a prototype
of a material practice in design that contributes to ecological restoration.
This collaboration aims to invite other practitioners to explore further
opportunities beyond this specific cross-disciplinary venture. While
consciously operating in between practical and theoretical applications, this
research-creation seeks to serve as a model for alternative material practice.
“In the art of inquiry, the conduct of thought goes along with, and continually
answers to, the fluxes and flows of the materials with which we work” (Ingold,
2013, p.6)
Strauss’ slow encounter coupled with Ingold’s act of inquiry support an
intentionally decelerated process within a design paradigm. It is from this
methodology, paired with our commitment to locality and community, that
this research emerged. In order to imagine a material-based practice that is
environmentally, socially, economically, and culturally considerate, this work
took its time. Implementing slower, open-ended ways of working that leave
room for dead-ends and redirection is what allowed the progression of the
collaboration to ebb and flow to where it is today. In this patient approach, we
began by learning the histories of the landscape, along with identification and
research of the material in its raw, organic form, followed by understanding
the implications of its expanding presence to identify and prototype potential
opportunities for it after its removal. In practice, the emphasis was not
confined to any specific outcome, but rather that the process be saturated
with a comprehensive contextual awareness in order to establish a new
system for material ethics and responsibility within design practice.

Alfred Crosby coined

4

the term ecological
imperialism as means to
describe the way European
settlers have successfully
colonized other regions by
purposely and incidentally
introducing animals, plants
and diseases which led to
dreadful shifts in ecology
and to population collapses
in the endemic peoples.
“Himalayan blackberry

5

was first introduced to BC
as a berry crop. This plant
can grow almost anywhere.
It spreads by seed (from
birds and people spreading
berries) and by rooting
from stems that touch the
ground. As a result, it is
one of the most widespread
invasive plants in Metro
Vancouver.”

The removal of Scotch broom acts not only in the service of our natural
environments, but additionally as a physical expression of decolonization. The
action of removal, a tool of ecological restoration, coupled with the utilization
of this untapped material resource, offers a unique and provocative inquiry.
Scotch broom is an opportunistic invasive plant species found throughout
the coastal areas of the Pacific Northwest of North America. It is prolific both
in its physical presence, particularly when in bright yellow spring bloom, but
also as an area of concern amongst ecologists. Broom is an early colonizer, a
designation appropriate both for its ecological function and cultural history of
introduction and propagation due to its capacity to infiltrate recently cleared
and disturbed sites. Mature plants as young as five years old can produce
eighteen thousand to 31,500 hundred seeds annually (Lee, 2010, p.50).
Once established, broom colonies are adept at displacing native plant
species, altering soil chemistry, as well as causing fire hazards in an
increasingly unpredictable climate (Caldwell, 2006, p.1). Scotch broom is on
record to have been brought to British Columbia, where this research resides,
in the mid-19th century. Though its precise carrier and intention is still
debated, it was, and still is to many, well known as a beloved ornamental plant
by Scottish colonists as it was a reminder of their home landscapes of Great
Britain (Lee, 2010, p.47). For others, it is an example of so-called “ecological
imperialism”4.
As this paper is written, Scotch broom is considered one of the most
invasive plant species in British Columbia and is pervasively removed and
destroyed en masse to prevent the uprooted plants from reseeding. The
plants are so established in this climate that few consider eradication a
possibility, not unlike the case with Himalayan Blackberry5, and instead

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focus on management of the spread. As broom diminishes biodiversity in
our local ecosystems and is easily identifiable all over British Columbia, it
draws the attention of a range of concerned parties. From casual naturalists
to organizations committed to ecological and habitat restoration, it is an
easy target—and an even easier enemy to rally behind. Nevertheless, we
must carefully consider broom’s potential gifts and engage our mutual
responsibility as Anishnaabe land stewards understand it (Reo et al., 2018).
As the negative impact of Scotch broom on this landscape is widely accepted
amongst local ecological restorationists, investing time into researching its
properties and application is valuable and necessary work.

Sharon Kallis of the

6

EarthHand Gleaners Societ y

7

Harvested from underneath

the south end of the Burrard
Bridge in Vancouver, BC.

Opportunities to

8

We approached Scotch broom with the intention of prototyping its usefulness
as a resource, which meant trialling it out with the tools and methods at our
disposal. With little to no literature confirming contemporary use of broom
as a material resource, we started the research by looking into the plant’s
history and reaching out to local community members6. This is how we
came to find research introducing us to its traditional use and processing in
Southern Italy. Before the industrialization of textiles made the processing
of cellulose-based folk fibres nearly obsolete, coarse fabric was woven
from the fibres of Ginestra (broom). Inspired and reinforced by this bygone
practice, pl.lab’s investigations on material properties of Scotch broom have
primarily been focused on leveraging its high fibre content and expanding its
applications. Our first experience of harvesting and processing broom was
replicating this traditional process. The raw material was sorted, bundled,
boiled in soda ash, soaked, crushed, resorted, carded, spun, finally resulting
in a short yet confirming bit of rope.
Engaging with the plant in this first exploration familiarized us with its
potential practical applications. Our next step was to apply another traditional
craft, cedar-paper making, to Scotch broom by stripping, processing and
pounding the bark and primary fibre stalk. The lab’s most recent endeavour
is developing a concrete-like material composed of broom fibre and calcium
carbonate (CCaO3)8. This mineral is primarily known as lime, commercially
derived from limestone, while it is also accessible in seashells. With the
principle to research our bioregion’s (various) untapped material resources,
this composite material was successfully trialled with locally foraged oyster
shells.

responsibly source oyster
shells for CCaO3 have
been illuminated through
conversations with Marnie
Bowman, a material
designer from Fanny Bay
on Vancouver Island, BC.
Her access to shells as a
byproduct of the region’s
extensive oyster farming
operations has brought to
light the massive amount
of shells cast aside,
accumulating more each
season.

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Each investigation has brought to light properties of Scotch broom that
reinforce our initial hypothesis of its potential to become a resource of
considerable usefulness should it be integrated into our resource economy.
Furthermore, it has exemplified a rare opportunity to establish a local material
resource that it would be advantageous to run out of.

↘
conclusion

Moving into the future, where the only constant will continue to be change,
adaptable material practices must be in place. Creative solutions to
unimaginable quandaries will mould our futures as sustainable practices
continue in popularit y among progressive design and art institutions,
studios, and enterprises. Bio-material designers are making headlines with
increasingly inspiring and innovative projects. Still, the answers to scalabilit y
of these conceptual presentations are not yet exhaustive enough to stand up
to the market as alternative solutions to conventional materials.
Through the logistical challenges of working in an area of research with
little precedent research to build off of, we have practiced what we sought to
do. In practice, developing a material or processing method for an invasive
plant species as a means of exhausting it from our ecosystem is flawed as a
business model. If we were to run out of broom by ‘creating a material that we
want to exploit, refine and deplete’, our poignant, evocative tagline, then what
would we do?
We move on. We must. This proposed circumstance is not unlike what we
are experiencing now as a global communit y. The rapid depletion of finite
resources will force us into these quandaries as we continue to use them
faster than we can replenish. With this in mind, we stress the value of working
slowly, and from the ground up—always keeping the implications of our
designs, especially regarding material choice, as the first step.
This all comes back to the notion that this work is not about developing a
marketable material, something that we can easily source, process, produce,
and profit from, but instead opening up the potentials of this widely available
material to the public. Transcending from the commercialized practice
of design to focus on product development, as this venture lives through
process. While reflecting on the ethical conflict to allow interfering into
ecological systems again, we stand by the goal to run out of Scotch broom.
As climate change proceeds, this plant species will thrive more than before
and, without further management, remain increasingly abundant, absolutely
free, and of service to the community to remove. As the lab continues this
research along with other ongoing collaborative projects, it will continue to
start where this one did—slowly—and with fellow communit y members right
there at the table alongside it.

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↘
afterword

This way of working was central to Jean Chisholm and Laura Kozak’s work
regarding Place-Based Responsibility at Emily Carr Universit y of Art &
Design. It was this foundation that supported the research within the placebased material lab, short pl.lab, and provided invaluable cultural framing
and context. The cohort that adapted to this ideology, the Place-Based
Grad Collective, sought to prioritize place and land as primary stakeholders
in research through design practice. It presumed an opportunit y and
responsibilit y that we have as influencers of culture, habits, and the future.
The work within pl.lab was continued and supported by the 2021 Satellite
Residency through the Shumka Centre for Entrepreneurship furthering the
lab’s network and visibilit y to the public.
In practice, this work would have been impossible without interdisciplinarit y
as a founding principle. These investigations included outreach to the
Invasive Species Council of British Columbia (ISCBC), meeting with the
BioProducts Institute at the Universit y of British Columbia (BPI), and material
designer Marni Bowman, to name a few. This work can only influence the
regional resource and material culture if it incorporates as many sectors as
it affects and is widely available for the communit y to locate and access. As
the research and development of this investigation continues, we get closer
to developing reliable methods and instructions suitable for open-source
distribution.

96

↘
bibliography

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Curry, P. (2011). Ecological Ethics: An Introduction (2nd ed.). Polity.
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Ingold, T. (2013). Making: Anthropology, Archaeology, Art and Architecture (1st
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Orr, D. W. (2004). The Nature of Design: Ecology, Culture, and Human
Intention. Oxford University Press.
Parks, J. (2021). The poetics of extractivism and the politics of visibility.
Textual Practice, 35(3), 353-362.
Reo, N.J., Ogden, L.A. Anishnaabe Aki: an indigenous perspective on the
global threat of invasive species. Sustain Sci 13, 1443–1452 (2018). https://
doi.org/10.1007/s11625-018-0571-4
Spirn, A. W. 1995. Constructing Nature: The Legacy of Frederich Law
Olmsted. In W. Cronon, ed., Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature.
New York: W. W. Norton.
Sylvan, R., Bennett, D. 1994. The Greening of Ethics: From Human Chauvinism
to Deep-Green Theory. Cambridge: White Horse Press.
Strauss, C. (2017). Slow Reader: A Resource for Design Thinking and
Practice. Valiz.
Caldwell, B. A. (2006). Effects of invasive scotch broom on soil properties in
a Pacific coastal prairie soil. Applied Soil Ecology, 32(1), 149–152. https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.apsoil.2004.11.008
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BC Studies, 166, 39–54.

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↘
appendix

Chiara Schmitt:
Chiara is a product designer, maker and design researcher focussing on
material-driven explorations in craft and design. Through her work, she
explores areas of sustainabilit y by dealing with natural materials and
resources in the field of material speculations. With a strong interest lying in
their perception and sensation, her practice touches on the agency of social
responsibilit y and sustainable behavior. Having completed her BA at the
Universit y of Applied Sciences Schwäbisch Gmünd in Germany, Chiara is now
pursuing an MDes at Emily Carr Universit y of Art and Design.
Christa Clay
Christa Clay is a maker, designer, and researcher based out of Vancouver,
BC, where she is currently pursuing a Masters in Design at Emily Carr
Universit y. Her practice is place-based, incorporating local material research
as well as ethics and protocols around material harvest and process. The
center of her research focuses on how material agency can strengthen our
capacit y to support circular economic models in urban communities. During
her studies, Christa has worked as a farmer and gardener when she is not
honing her woodworking and ceramics practice. She is originally from Austin,
Texas, but has lived in B.C since 2018.

pl.lab
The place-based material lab, short pl.lab, is a research and design lab with
a mission to understand material ethics and responsibilit y from the land
and places on which we work, live, and play. The collaborative approach
of this project allows us to work with students, facult y, and external cocreators with the collective goal to create a meshwork of data through
resources, experiences, contacts and protocols. Through this work we hope
to build a foundation from which to share and offer knowledge and open up
conversation on place-based and responsible material practices.
www.pllab.ca/

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Thank you.