Make do and Mend at Transition Gallery LondonMake do and Mend is an ongoing project which has taken place in Manchester, London, and New York. Make do and Mend involves the collection and rejuvenation of discarded material found on city streets. In November I spent a week in London exploring the area around Transition Gallery and Broadway Market, looking for objects to work with for an event I hosted at the gallery on December 3rd as part of Super Nature. The images on this blog document the projects. For further details and information visit Transition Gallery website.
When I visited London in November I explored the area surrounding the gallery and found a pair of mens's shoes in a bus stop off Broadway Market, near Transition. I took them back to Manchester with me. There I had them resoled and reheeled at Timpsons in Didsbury with beautifully embossed leather soles. I also took them to John Hedleys Foil and Emboss Printing, in Ancoats, where I asked them to make a block to add some gilt text to the soles of the shoes. On the undersole of the right shoe the text reads "I found these shoes in a bus stop near Broadway market" and on the left undersole it reads " I have cleaned repaired and erturned them here for someone else to re use". I then took them back to London for an off site project at Transition Gallery where exhibited them in the gallery as part of a forum I hosted. Later that day, and with visitors to the gallery, I returned them to the bus stop where I'd found them and left them there. When I went back a couple of hours later they had gone. 
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