Make your memories last forever
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/02/2020 (2055 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Last July a new business opened on Osborne Street. It is called Memory Castings, owned and operated by artist Desneige Meyer, who recently moved back to Manitoba with her family, bringing her artistic business with her.
Meyer graduated from the University of Alberta with a bachelor of fine arts degree. She majored in glass blowing and travelled to Venice, Norway and the Czech Republic to increase her knowledge of the art of glass blowing. She discovered that this art was more of an industry and that it was similar to factory work with time pressures, repetitive work and production quotas.
Meyer moved to British Columbia and sought advice on how to use her skills.
She decided to try casting moulds of children’s extremities. “I bought supplies and I borrowed babies from my friends,” Meyer said.
She learned how to make shadow boxes — glass front display cases containing objects — in a framing workshop.
Meyer started making moulds of baby hands and feet 13 years ago in B.C. She uses a non-toxic, hypo-allergenic dental alginate made from seaweed. It is warm and squishy.The baby puts his hand or foot into the container of alginate for about 45 seconds.
“The casting process is usually fine,” said Meyers. “Some babies sleep through the casting.”
It is the precocious one-year olds who can be challenging in the casting process. Meyer, who has two children, gets on well with the one-year olds.
Hydrostone, a durable product similar to Plaster of Paris, is used to fill the cast. The little hands and feet may be painted with metallic paint and eventually put into shadow boxes. It takes approximately five weeks to complete framed memory castings.
Meyer uses her Osborne location for other purposes beside Memory Castings. Mommy Connections, a parenting class for moms and babies, ran every Tuesday morning last fall.
Artist Suzanne Lemay’s striking paintings hang on the south wall of the building. They are for sale alongside some furniture that has been gorgeously recovered by Meyer’s grandmother.
Memory Castings is located at 721 Osborne St., but does not currently have fixed hours. Reach Desneige Meyer by email at desneige@memorycastings.com or call her toll free at 1-877-615-8450.
Dianne Doney is a community correspondent for Fort Rouge. You can contact her at diannemary@hotmail.com