As a praise for slowness, travelling in a canoe as well as building one are favorable times for contemplation and thinking, and great ways to understand the complex reality of our world.
During this hazardous one year long travel, KDS first year design students understood through experience, the enormous impact that a designer line or a formal choice could have on the production process. Indeed, it is a false belief that the designers job stops after the drawing table. Designers have the mission to ensure the project followings beyond realization since they are guardians of the original intent.
It is with this objective in mind that I have engaged students in a strip build canoe construction. From the raw timbers, they have had to be patient and smart to strip, assemble and laminate the wooden piece forming the shell of this boat. But what’s more satisfying, at the end of the journey, that sitting inside and slowly rowing toward the rest of the adventure?
This project was done under my direction. The canoe was produced by the KDS 2017-2018 first year students.