SweaterLodge Unlatched

Friday, January 14, 2011 to Sunday, May 1, 2011

MOV Studio Exhibit

Suspended in the Museum of Vancouver, a mammoth polarfleece sweater becomes a soft lodge. Come experience an exhibit that's uniquely Vancouver.

SweaterLodge is an architectural installation consisting of a giant orange polarfleece sweater. It measures 26.5 meters (87 feet) cuff to cuff and is made of Polartec 200 fleece made of recycled two-litre plastic pop bottles. 3,150 two-litre pop bottles went into making all the polarfleece used throughout the entire exhibit, approximately 2,560 into the sweater fleece alone.

The installation is a portrait of Vancouver where the veneration of nature and the construction of urban culture stand at curious odds.

It is part art, part architecture and all commentary on Vancouver.

Visitors are given a booklet to guide them through the experience. At the end of the visit visitors are encouraged to take home a piece of orange fleece to make something wonderful from. Photos of the fleece creations can then be submitted to the Flickr group "Museum of Vancouver MOV" and will be printed out and posted in the gallery throughout the run of the exhibition.

SweaterLodge represented Canada at the 2006 Venice Biennale of Architecture and was created by Bill Pechet and Stephanie Robb of Pechet and Robb Art and Architecture, pechetandrobb.com.