June 18th and 19th, The Stop Community Food Centre hosted their second annual Stop Night Market in the Honest Ed’s alleyway in Toronto, inviting over 50 Toronto chefs as well as showcasing the food cart designs of Waterloo Architecture students and alumni.
A call for proposals back in February got the juices flowing, and local designers submitted one-panel proposals for this year’s food carts. 36 designs were chosen, 16 of which belonged to teams made up of at least one UWSA student/alumni.
Designers pay for all expenses associated with the design and production of their cart and are required to transport it to the site and remove it after the event is over; this is their contribution to the charitable event.
Over the past few weeks, Claire Lubell and Nicole Bruun-Meyer of lb projects, could be found on Toronto patios and lounging in Trinity Bellwoods brainstorming about food vendors, forests and Canadiana. In past, the two have conducted research, talked Johannesburg and collaborated on publications but this time the conversation centered around their cart for The Stop’s Night Market.
Inspired by the informality and Canadian food of their pop-up restaurants, Wiggle Room and Royal Tree Beaver, the pair strived to embody the same spirit in their ‘forest-in-box’ cart. Wiggle Room has a container at Market 707 and Royal Tree Beaver typically cooks for festivals and hosts an annual cook-off fundraiser competition in his back yard.
After conceiving of the project, no drawings were made, instead they began by collecting sticks from cabins and backyard in the Toronto area. Their accumulated ‘forest’ then informed the construction of the rest of the cart. The supporting structure combines wood framing, a masonite base and signage panels, all obtained from the neighbourhood Portuguese hardware store. An acrylic sheet scavenged from the Hoxton bar by friends at Co.labs serves as the countertop to their contemporary Canadiana cart. All the components came together over the past few days in the Bruun-Meyer family backyard through an informal, improvisational process. For Claire and Nicole, the project provided “The enjoyment of building something, designing something, participating in a great event with a lot of good friends, getting involved in the design scene in Toronto and supporting The Stop.”
Yesterday, they wheeled their cart around the corner to Honest Ed’s for it’s inaugural night where the two chefs served a menu of East Coast style fries and a true Canadian mash-up, butter chicken on potato pancakes, off a cart akin to their shared spirit.
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