The ‘thrift store for art supplies’ welcomes you with open arms — and new (old) material
Photo by Sydney Lobe.
On a crisp blue day in January, I cross Douglas Street and walk half a block to my destination: a stretch of four uniform storefronts with glass doors and meringue-drop awnings. I am standing outside, searching for a unit number to confirm that I found the correct address, when I see Ashley Howe, executive director of SUPPLY Victoria, peer around a pillar from inside the unit and wave me in.
SUPPLY Creative Reuse Centre launched a crowdfunding campaign to assist them in the cost of moving storefronts in 2023, and now the team is preparing to reopen to the public in their new location come late February — more accessible, and more colourful, than ever.
As I let the door to SUPPLY’s new digs swing closed behind me, Howe saunters through the empty room to a plastic folding table near the windows, where she turns off a pop song playing from an iPad. Two of her colleagues look up from wall-painting and offer me warm welcomes to the renovation zone.
The unit, a capacious suite near the Royal BC Museum, will be the Creative Reuse Centre’s new home in a month’s time. For now, Howe and two colleagues are puttering around the rental unit and preparing the space for full functionality. Today, they are painting with outrageous shades of pink, yellow, and purple, which they hope will encourage their clients’ creativity and sense of material play.
“Let me show you the vision board,” says Howe, unlocking her iPad to reveal a collage of delightful interior design inspiration. “This is kind of our idea. Oh, and we’re going to have these two muralists work on our walls!” she adds, swiping to samples of the artists’ work.
Howe sparkles with the joy of creativity, as does the space, empty as it may currently be — save for a few paint cans, rolls of masking tape, and stepladders littered about. Howe’s excitement about the renovations is evidence of her passion for SUPPLY’s mission: to provide their customers with low-cost access to used art materials. This is a win for art-lovers and a step toward environmental sustainability.
“[It’s] like a thrift store for art supplies,” says Howe.
Paint, brushes, yarn, fabric, candle-making supplies, beading material, and jewelry-making bits and bobs are just a few examples of the kinds of donated art materials to which SUPPLY offers a second life.
Traditional art supplies aren’t all that SUPPLY sells in-store, though. Customers are encouraged to find new uses for unlikely art materials, like sheets of metal, bottlecaps, wine corks, or produce bags.
“There’s more than enough stuff in Victoria,” says Howe. “We just need a physical space to hold those things and give them another shot before they get thrown away.”
To operate efficiently, relocation was necessary. Their old store, Howe tells me, was an operative nightmare.
Built in the 1930s, the building was inaccessible in a number of ways. Not only did customers with accessibility concerns have a difficult time getting into the store, but without a loading zone, donors also struggled to bring heavy boxes down the street and inside.
While SUPPLY’s relocation wasn’t without its challenges — namely moving their catalog of materials out of the old difficult-to-access location, finding an affordable unit, and hiring a lawyer — it was worthwhile for a new space that promised more solutions than it did problems.
“Now all of those needs have been met,” says Howe. Their new space, which is roomier and boasts both a loading zone and an accessible entrance, is a chance to expand SUPPLY’s vision and the goods and services they can offer.
SUPPLY has always run creative reuse workshops. Now, the City of Victoria is leasing SUPPLY their new space for below market rate in exchange for one art workshop per month in their neighbouring rental space. According to Howe, this initiative will foster community and help keep the Creative Reuse Centre operating at a reasonable cost.
Howe hopes that these workshops will help people see old materials in a new light and think critically about their consumption practices.
SUPPLY’s GoFundMe, which closes on Feb. 1, is over 85 per cent of the way to their goal of $14 000.
“The donations allow us to build this Creative Reuse Center that’s more accessible, even more useful, even more efficient, so we can divert even more materials from the landfill,” says Howe, adding that it’s also “even more colorful and inspiring, so that people are excited to make things.”
At the end of our conversation, Howe leaves to take a call outside. As I pull on my coat, Carly, a SUPPLY regular who was volunteering to paint the walls for a day, squats down to reach the bottom corners of a pillar with yellow paint. She tells me that while she loves that SUPPLY offers “yard sale prices” on art materials, her favourite thing to purchase at the reuse centre is office supplies, like pens and sharpies.
“No one ever has to go to staples ever again,” she says, laughing. “You can just come here and get one envelope instead of a thousand.”
