Singh says she likes to zero in on the beauty of plant material when it’s alive and when it’s dead. “I’m paying homage to these materials because I know that they’re beneficial to us,” she says.May Truong/The Globe and Mail
In January, the Umbra flagship store in Toronto hosted Lucid Ideas, a prototype exhibition produced in partnership with the annual DesignTO Festival. Stephanie Singh, an interdisciplinary artist with a studio in Mississauga, Ont., showcased her Island Table, a shapely piece of furniture with a silhouette that reflects the contours of Jamaica’s topography. Encased in its resin top are a wealth of spices, fruits and flowers from the Caribbean locale, suspended to create a decorative piece imbued with personal significance and storytelling. It is a showstopper object that, curiously, has its origins in the age-old conundrum of how to stylishly preserve a wedding bouquet.
Singh is photographed in her studio in Mississaugua, Ontario.May Truong/The Globe and Mail
“The Island Table uses all of these vibrant materials that you see on the island – things that people may have enjoyed with their family,” Singh says of the sentimental facet of its design. Both sets of Singh’s grandparents immigrated to Canada from Jamaica and she frequently visited there in her youth. The furniture’s form is also a nod to the tradition of having a wood carving in the shape of the island hanging in your house. “I wanted to home in on that and hold onto those memories.”
This was the first year Singh participated in DesignTO. For her dynamic effort – and the work of the show’s curators and designers – Lucid Ideas won the festival’s People’s Choice Award for favourite exhibition. Singh’s work has been earning similar accolades since 2022, when a series of vases made from the pulp of marijuana, sugarcane and other plants were included in the Royal Ontario Museum’s Canadian Modern exhibition of iconic homegrown design. Since then, she’s exhibited at 1000 Vases gallery in Paris and been commissioned to create original pieces for the Waldorf Astoria Orlando.
“My mother and my grandmother taught me the impact of botanicals for health, and the connection between wellness and plants in general,” Singh says of what drew her to incorporate these earthy elements into her designs. “People often overlook plants – like sure, they’re pretty when they’re alive, and then when they die, they’re done with.” Singh says she likes to zero in on the beauty of plant material when it’s alive and when it’s dead. “I’m paying homage to these materials because I know that they’re beneficial to us,” she says.
Singh’s Island Table is pictured with the artist’s Pulp vases, which are crafted from wood and floral leftovers.May Truong/The Globe and Mail
Her artistic practice’s exploration of conservancy through objects took a turn in 2021, when she received her first bridal commission. While the Island Table tells the story of one location’s vital verdancy and how it’s intertwined with the lives of its inhabitants, Singh says that her creative use of resin was sparked while making a piece of art from a wedding client’s bouquet. She continues to turn a bridal party’s moribund blooms and festive table arrangements into any manner of keepsakes from scarves to paper to wall-mounted artworks.
Recollections, and the objects and ingredients that conjure them, are a potent theme in Singh’s sustainability-centric practice, which focuses on salvaging waste materials and the use of natural dyes. Culminating in the creation of decor objects and furniture pieces that are compellingly textural, the use of plants also captures the ability of everyday materials to poetically enmesh the tangible with the ethereal.
For more, visit stephanieangela.com.