This version of A Tile a Day was created as an installation for an exhibition at UCA Farnham.
It was created over three months, during which I made one handmade paper tile each day. The pulp for the papermaking process was created from discarded academic texts and essays I had accumulated throughout my final year at university, using rainwater I patiently collected. Each tile contains a unique pressed or steamed plant fragment, gathered with permission, a practice I learned from a Greek herbalist, and is softly backlit to reveal its intricate details and natural beauty.
The work was nestled within a carefully curated space designed to support wellbeing, featuring soft ambient lighting reminiscent of sunlight, recorded birdsong, and a handcrafted bench made from felled wood to encourage stillness and reflection.
Through this act of daily making, the work offers a simple and accessible way of engaging with complex challenges: one step at a time. It suggests that even the most overwhelming problems, whether personal or planetary, can be approached through small, consistent actions.
From tile one to eighty-one, the series became a physical embodiment of commitment, illustrating the transformative potential of perseverance and care. By offering a repeatable method for initiating change, I hope to empower others to begin where they are, with what they have, and to trust that each step, however small, will contribute to something greater over time.
Through its intentionally 'slow' pace and considered methods, the work also challenges dominant systems that prioritise productivity, speed and extraction over care. Instead, it advocates for slower, more sustainable ways of being: ways that do not exhaust the maker or the Earth.
I created A Tile a Day because I want to help. It is infused with the knowledge and insight I have gathered through years of research, creative practice and reflection. It was made in the hope that it might ease, inspire or support those who view it. In doing so, I hope to contribute, however modestly, to both collective and planetary healing.
