Common Fields: Designing a future for commensality
September 2021 – ongoing
The title of this project takes its name from arable land used for crop growing, as well as research into brownfield or ex-industrial sites around Manchester, and how they can be re-purposed for community use. A common is also defined as a piece of open land for public use, or a similarity shared by several groups, people or things. The similarity in this case, is a need (a right) to open green space, engagement with nature, and to fix the broken systems that determine how we source, consume and value food.
Common Fields is an ongoing design and research project investigating the act of commensality, how this has changed throughout history — especially more recently, during the COVID-19 pandemic — and how visual and participatory arts can help us reconnect with our food and one another, and repair our relationship with nature and our local environments. Designing a sustainable future for commensality.
92 pages, risograph and digital printed and spiral bound, with a foil embossed greyboard cover. Edition of 20.
Repast: M.F.K. Fisher and the Art of Eating Through a Crisis
August 2021
REPAST is a column for MOLD Magazine, telling the stories of cooks, designers and scientists who shaped food history, to help us design better food futures.
"In 1942 M.F.K. Fisher released How to Cook a Wolf, in response to wartime rationing and economic uncertainty. At this point in her life, Fisher had already written two books and was mourning the tragic death of her second husband. The book intended to inspire creative home cooking, despite obvious difficulties. How to Cook a Wolf is filled with poetic descriptions, signature dry wit, and, every now and then, a recipe. Likely a breath of fresh air for households being told to “make do” with less, Fisher encouraged experimentation, invention and appetite."
Repast: Viva La Causa –– Designing a Union for Farm Workers
July 2021
REPAST is a column for MOLD Magazine, telling the stories of cooks, designers and scientists who shaped food history, to help us design better food futures.
"United Farm Workers of America was formed in 1966 by uniting the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC) – led by Larry Itliong, a Filipino-American cannery and agricultural worker – and the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA), led by César Chávez and Dolores Huerta. The two unions, in joining forces, brought together communities of Filipino and Mexican migrant workers, in the fight for better wages, working conditions and workers’ rights."
Printing with Plants
June 2021
Printing with Plants was a workshop collaboration between Holly Eliza Temple and Kat Wood, hosted at Where The Light Gets In and the restaurant's food growing space, The Landing.
The workshop consisted of a garden cyanotype print session hosted by Kat Wood, followed by food and drinks in the restaurant, and a bookbinding activity hosted by Holly Eliza Temple. Risograph posters and bookbinding instruction handouts designed and printed by Holly Eliza Temple (bookbinding instructions printed on wildflower seeded paper for participants to take home and plant).
Repast: Horace Fletcher, the Original Food Faddist
May 2021
REPAST is a column for MOLD Magazine, telling the stories of cooks, designers and scientists who shaped food history, to help us design better food futures.
"In “Fads—Fanciful, Foolish, and Suicidal” in Diet and Die (1935), public health educator Carl Malmberg introduces the reader to the idea of food fads being “generally the work of some fakir who has lifted an idea out of thin air” but that “the promoter of the fad offers the idea as the most important discovery in years”. Malmberg then uses Horace Fletcher as a case study to illustrate the poor scientific backing and the damage that these crazes cause to public health."
Repast: Grete Lihotzky, the Social Architect
April 2021
REPAST is a column for MOLD Magazine, telling the stories of cooks, designers and scientists who shaped food history, to help us design better food futures.
"There was no standard design to a kitchen like we know today. However, as the war had wiped out accrued wealth and the ability to afford household staff, advertising and product inventions shifted their focus to a new customer— the housewife. With the goal of making domestic life easier for women, the innovations made to kitchens in the 1920s were classed as feminist advancement."
FILLER issue 05
April 2021
FILLER is a self-published magazine about food and mental health. What began as an experimental zine in 2018 now features work from worldwide artists and writers, provoking important discourse around how food trends and media affect our mental wellbeing.
Issue 05 was published with the help of a Start-Up grant from Santander Universities x University of Brighton, and features 25 contributors responding to the theme of "The Future".
An 80 page A4 magazine with A3 risograph print, designed, edited and published by Holly Eliza Temple. Cover illustration by Taxi Cab Industries.
Eat With Your Eyes
March 2021
Eat With Your Eyes is a mindful food zine kit providing everything you need to create a hand-bound book to document stories, memories and experiences with your food –– encouraging us to engage more mindfully with what and how we eat.
The kits are housed in a string and washer envelope and contain enough recycled cartridge paper for a 16 page zine, heavyweight coloured cover paper, linen thread hand-dyed with onion skins, a bookbinding needle, binding instructions and a prompt sheet for documenting interactions with food.
Commissioned by and available to buy at Where The Light Gets In.
Repast: George Washington Carver, the Agricultural Educator
March 2021
REPAST is a column for MOLD Magazine, telling the stories of cooks, designers and scientists who shaped food history, to help us design better food futures.
"From 1902 to 1905, Carver started to dedicate his research to finding alternatives to growing cotton. He carried out crop rotation experiments—a method championed by modern farming practices—and published his findings in Bulletin 6, “How to Build Up Worn Out Soils”. Beyond rotating crops to reintroduce nutrients to the ground, Carver also promoted organic fertilizers—using natural materials to increase productivity—now commonplace in organic and biodynamic farming methods."
Repast: Alexis Soyer, the Victorian Celebrity Chef
Feb 2021
REPAST is a column for MOLD Magazine, telling the stories of cooks, designers and scientists who shaped food history, to help us design better food futures.
"After writing a letter to The Times in 1855 offering his services, he travelled to the Scutari Hospital, where he worked to improve catering for British soldiers. Already the inventor of the “Magic Stove” which could be fueled by any household spirit, Soyer developed the field stove, which could withstand all weathers, save fuel and provide warmth. Working with Florence Nightingale, he also upgraded hospital and camp kitchens, and transformed daily regimes and recipes to improve nutrition."
Hosting a Dinner Party in a Global Pandemic
Jan 2021
TERRA BITE was an online dinner party hosted via Zoom during the UK's COVID-19 lockdown Dec 2020. The dinner party invited participants to cook with seasonal, accessible ingredients with interesting histories and folklore properties (supplied via risograph printed ingredients cards mailed out to them) –– in a bid to feel more connected to our ingredients, kitchen and each other during the pandemic.
The resulting dinner party was a virtual experiment and discussion, in which we could feel as though we were sat at the same table sharing food and stories. Participants received a riso printed information card, ingredients card and sachet of rosemary seeds (one of the listed ingredients).
The recipes and experiences shared were documented in a cookbook-cum-guidebook titled Hosting A Dinner Party in A Global Pandemic: A Guide For The Domestically Isolated.
Eight out of Ten
Dec 2020
Eight out of Ten is a risograph printed art book to document my late grandfather’s recipes and handwriting, collected from his cookbooks used when he was in the Army Catering Corps.
Edition of 10 with hand-embossed cover and coil-bound.
Cooking for Christmas
Dec 2020
Design and typesetting of Cooking for Christmas, a 32 page recipe zine by food writer Bre Graham.
Raising funds for domestic violence charity Refuge.
20:20 Print Exchange
October 2020
20cm x 20cm risograph print created for Hot Bed Press' 20:20 print exchange.
Protection Circle depicts the folklore properties of sea salt as a protective and healing force.
Three colour CMY imitation, printed on 300gsm cartridge paper –– formed a pack of 20 prints sent to print exchange participants all over the world.