The items in the box remind me of the time I spent sewing with my mother, of her tins of buttons, remembering the outfits they once belonged to, and her reasons for keeping all the mismatched ones.

“A small object like a button holds a lifetime of memories.”

I feel a sense of responsibility for this archive and the owner’s perseverance in saving and domestic labour. I use the quiet and repetitive rhythm of mending to iterate the elements in the box: repeat, reorganize, re-materialize and reimagine all of the forgotten memories left behind and held within it.

I use the processes of kiln-cast glass and cast-plaster to give the discarded contents a presence and a new life. I design the large buttons (15cm diameter) using Rhino software, 3D printing and reproduce them using plaster in vacuum-formed moulds, or cast them in glass using the lost-wax technique.

The coloured plaster buttons are dyed multiple times while others are kept their natural colour. I rust old steel sewing pins. I do not use the original buttons or objects in the piece.

“To cast an object is to create a memory of that object”

Dimensions: 18” X 18” X 20”

Materials: Metal tin, kiln-cast glass, plaster, dyed-plaster, rusted pins, wood base.

'22 "Connections 2022" Juried GAS member exhibition. Tacoma Glass Museum, Tacoma, USA.

'21 "The Sewing Box" craft-based installation. The Window Gallery, Craft Council of BC, Vancouver, BC

Phase Transition • The Sewing Box • My Mother’s Button Collection •