Maple Ridge Community Mosaic: Open to the Public!

11th March 2020 By Admin

On Sunday, February 23, a year almost to the day since we held our first public workshop for the Maple Ridge Community Mosaic, we proudly returned to the freshly renovated Maple Ridge Leisure Centre for the Grand Re-opening celebrations.

The facility was open admission-free for the pool party, music, prizes, and other activities throughout the day.  Mayor Mike Morden kindly gave us a special mention during his speech and we were especially honoured to be asked to join him along with other councillors and guests for the ribbon-cutting ceremony and for a piece of the official cake.

For more information about the Maple Ridge Community Mosaic check out the City of Maple Ridge’s Public Art website.

Maple Ridge Community Mosaic: Installation

21st February 2020 By Admin

In December 2019, after months of careful planning and preparation, everything was ready for the final installation of the Maple Ridge Community Mosaic.  The installation of the three mosaic walls took seven days.

Professional tile installer, Pedram ‘Tony’ Okhovat laying the first section of the Maple Ridge Community Mosaic on the shower wall adjacent to the main swimming pool at MRLC

Laser levels and spacers are used to make sure that the entire artwork is straight and evenly spaced

Sections of the shower wall mosaic are unboxed and prepared for installation

Tony applying fresh thinset to the waiting area wall ready to set mosaic sections

Rebecca calculating final measurements and custom cuts

Tony cutting tiles on the wet saw

Rebecca inspecting the waiting area wall

David and Tony hand-setting the edge details

Rebecca and Tony finishing the reception area mosaic

David removing the clear face tape from set tiles

Maple Ridge Community Mosaic: Artwork Assembly

20th February 2020 By Admin

When all the custom tiles had been extruded, baked, glazed, re-fired and ready, we began assembling the Maple Ridge Community Mosaics.

The twelve custom colours for the Maple Ridge Community Mosaic

The mosaics are prepared in small sections that are numbered and correspond to coordinates on a large map.  Each of the ~14,500 custom made tiles are laid by hand, carefully following the design and using special templates to make sure that the tiles are evenly spaced.  After each section has been laid, it gets checked, covered with a layer of clear face tape, coded, mounted to a protective card and boxed ready for transport to Maple Ridge.

Checking the details to ensure a perfect fit

Quality Control

Test layout

Applying face tape and section code

Marking boxes for shipment

Loading 1500lbs of artwork into the cargo van