The folks at Boundary Bay Quilters’ Guild have turned a negative into a positive by creating several tote bags from Pride banners that have been slashed and vandalized in the last couple of years.
The banners were part of the guild’s Banners to Bags program, started a year ago, when the sewers and stitchers began recycling hundreds of City of Delta street pole banners that had been sitting in storage.
“Personally, I felt bad when the Pride banners were damaged and the church [Ladner United] was vandalized because I have a member of my family who falls into one of those letters,” said Dawn Fielden, with the Quilters’ Guild. “Who doesn’t know somebody, or who is related to somebody, who would be part of that group? And to think there are people out there doing stuff like that, it’s upsetting.”
Last June, several City of Delta Pride Month banners had black paint splashed on them. Vandals also targeted in the same fashion the window that was showing the Progress Pride flag in Ladner United Church in May 2023.
Pride flags had been moved inside after previously being cut, egged and painted when they were displayed outside the church.
And in June 2022, the Progress Pride flag displayed outside Delta city hall also was cut down.
Fielden said that they received about 10 Pride banners, four of which had been vandalized. From those, the quilters made about 24 tote bags bearing the rainbow colours, some of which had the damaged areas covered with embroidery.
Those bags in turn were donated to the Delta Pride Society.
“When we heard the story of the wounded Pride flags, we made it a point to rescue those to make a statement,” said Guild member Kim Holloway. “They have been visibly mended with embroidered hearts and flowers and the words, ‘mended with pride in Delta.’”
The Pride banners though are but a small part of the 200 or so artsy city banners of all types that have been recycled into about 600 or 700 tote bags bearing vivid colours and designs.
“They become like modern art because we’re cutting them and turning them 90 degrees,” said Fielden.
Some bags say Delta or Tsawwassen or show images from local scenes.
“It’s really fun to look at the banners. We get quite excited when some new banners are trotted out,” added Fielden.
In return for the City of Delta donating workshop space to the guild on Mondays, the quilters give half of their production of tote bags to the city for use as promotional items. “They have been very happy with them,” said Fielden.
The quilters then sell the other half for $15 each as a fundraiser.
