Chapter 9: Celebrating the Greatness of Windsor AND Canada
Collaborators: Sydney Taylor, Tribal Printing, The Great Canadian Flag Project
Project: Oh Canada Tee
This year marks Canada's 150th as well as Windsor's 125th birthdays. Naturally, we had to come up with something to commemorate this momentous occasion... (enter Oh Canada tee)
The story of this design is equal parts celebratory and coincidence. Here's how it all came about:
Last year, we identified that one of our main focuses this year would be to incorporate more of a philanthropic aspect to our business. Then along came Peter Hrastovec. We met Peter Hrastovec (the man spearheading the Great Canadian Flag Project (GCFP)) last November at our vendor booth at the LUV LOCAL event at the Walkerville Brewery. We chatted about the flag project and the possibility of us supporting this cause - which we thought was a perfect tie-in to our idea to do a Windsor/Canada celebration design.
We then saw an article in the Windsor Star about the project and saw that the GCFP is about $60k short on their fundraising goals. This funding would be to not only erect the flag, but to maintain it for years to come. So to recap:
- Celebrate Windsor and Canada - CHECK
- Give back to the community - CHECK
- Help contribute to Windsor's history for years to come - CHECK
Needless to say, supporting this cause is a NO BRAINER!
The Design
We hired Sydney Taylor (the award-winning graphic designer we previously worked with) to work on putting together our idea for the design. Here are all the reasons why this design is not only stunning, but truly Canadian:
It supports a "great" cause - $5 from the sale of each shirt will be donated to support The Great Canadian Flag Project - a project that we are truly proud of and honoured to support (yes, we spelled "honoured" with a "u")
Smell the roses - Do you smell that? Yep, it's roses. The roses represent Windsor (also known as The City of Roses). What you might not have noticed is that there are exactly 125 roses in the design. This is to commemorate Windsor’s 125th birthday. The negative space formed by the roses forms a Canadian maple leaf. In fact, there are 25 leaves in the design, so there are 150 pieces in total that make the entire design (Oh Canada!). We are very proud of this design and are looking forward to sharing it with our fellow Canadians.
100 % designed and made in Canada - This is our very first design printed on Jerico clothing. If you are unfamiliar with Jerico, they produce Canadian-made, socially-conscious clothing. All of their clothing is dyed, cut, and stitched in Toronto. Therefore, we can truly say that this product is made in Canada (within 400km of Windsor) from the idea to the design to the actual product. So from concept to creation, you can be assured that this product is 100% Canadian!
Exceptionally fresh. Authentically Windsor. Truly Canadian. Oh Canada!