Placemaking in Southeast False Creek
Commissioned by the City of Vancouver Public Art Department, these sidewalk medallions explore and envision the relationship between the ecological heritage (prolific estuary, hunting and trade route for Coast Salish People) and the industrial heritage of SEFC, and the reintegration of the indigenous flora and fauna back into the landscape. A visual synthesis of ideas, the medallions offer a semi-literal, iconic chronology of the past uses of the SEFC site. Matching neighbourhood character with appropriate ecological taxonomies, an abstracted industrial icon occupies the centre core, ecological imagery surrounds the core and the outer rim employs text to locate pedestrians to the specific neighbourhood (Works Yard, Ship Yard, Rail Yard), alternating between name and a friendly sustainability axiom: tread lightly, look up, keep it growing.
This year, the medallions went into production and some have been installed in the developing private lands. The one you see here lives in the Shipyard outside the JJ Bean at 1st Ave. and Columbia. The foundry that we worked with created a little video of the process too — so sweet!