As a designer, I wanted to create something that held the story of two places: a functional object infusing the essence of tradition, relationships and inter-generational transfer. As a maker, I wanted that story to honour country; a piece born of Yuwaalaraay ngurrambaa (my own special family lands in the northwest of NSW) and that of Ferrone, Italy, where the material was sourced and objects are so beautifully hand crafted. As a visual communicator, I worked to embed those shared narratives through form and line, texture and materiality.
This piece for me is deeply personal. The story I give shares an insight into my own experience as a Yuwaalaraay woman. Stories of pink sand and rivers and lakes, of dhagaay (yellow belly pearch) baked in hot coals and shared with family, and the many seasons etched upon the bark of those old trees adorning generations of coolamon and wirri.
The story that is yet to be told, however, starts today on a new journey in the hands and minds of those who go on to use this wirri and embed it with their own stories of time, place and memory.
Yuwaalaraay woman Lucy Simpson is Creative Director and Principal Designer behind Sydney based design studio Gaawaa Miyay. Simpson’s process led practice is inspired by country, relationships, and notions of continuity. Guided by the philosophies of First Nations design, Simpson maps place, experience, and time (story) through materiality and transfer, with commercial / conceptual / community based projects and collaborations spanning a range of media and disciplines from interiors fashion and textiles, to glass ceramics and object design as well as public art and installation for over a decade.