My Place
Knick-knacked
BY Heather Marrin May 07, 2008 14:05
WHO: Meagan Durlak, 24, designer/illustrator (www.meagandurlak.com), and her three-legged cat, Walter.
WHAT: The second floor of a two-storey house near St. Clair West and Bathurst.
THE STORY: Durlak’s apartment is like her own idiosyncratic museum. She refers to the display boxes that house her trinkets as her “cabinets of curiosity.” Durlak arranges and rearranges her objects according to a mysterious, internal logic — small colourfully painted Asian masks will be placed beside a menagerie of animal miniatures and a grouping of old wooden sewing spools. Durlak has the tendency to pick up anything that fascinates her and these treasures often inspire her work. “Before starting a new design I always take a walk through my apartment and notice something new,” says Durlak.
One of Durlak’s favourite pieces is an old mason jar turned into a lamp that she found at local Goodwill. She unscrewed the top and filled the jar with old buttons she had collected over the years and placed an astronaut figurine in the centre. Durlak confesses she has a thing for outer space.
Durlak also has a thing for retro children’s books, apparent in the Ladybird series that she stacks on top of a shelf. A lot of her own illustrations, which are also displayed on the shelf, are inspired from these books. The key, it seems, is to keep the images you love close together and they will breed.
625 Church St, 6th Floor, Toronto M4Y 2G1
Related Stories
Into the future
Who: Matt Carr, design director for Umbra, and Joyce Lo, Toronto fashion designer.
Designer type
Carrie Hayes, 26, fashion designer and currently a resident at the Toronto Fashion Incubator.
Room to grow
Pillay and Field’s two-storey home appears unassuming at first glance, but once inside, lots of personalized touches reveal the couple’s creativity.
- EYEWEEKLY.COM
- Write a Letter to the Editor
- Masthead and Contacts
- Privacy Policy
- Employment Opportunities
- Advertise With Us
- Distribution
- Star Media Group Sites
- ren.ca
- canadianimmigrant.ca
- insurancehotline.com
- swaymag.ca
- More Star Pass Sites
- TheStar.com
- toronto.com
- Wheels.ca
- Ourfaves.ca
- LiveDeal.ca
