Muskowekwan First Nation honours three ASAU professors with Star Blankets
By Maria Cook
September 5, 2024
The Muskowekwan First Nation has bestowed Star Blankets, a deeply meaningful gift, upon Professor Stephen Fai, Adjunct Professor Lyette Fortin, and Adjunct Professor Jim Mountain, in recognition of their work with the community in Saskatchewan.
Since 2018, they and their architecture students have supported the community’s vision to repurpose a former residential school with a history of trauma and oppression into a place of healing, cultural learning, and community enterprise.
Giving a Star Blanket is an Indigenous cultural tradition representing profound honour and respect. When a blanket is placed on a person, they are wrapped with respect and admiration.
Band Councillor Vanessa Wolfe made the presentations to the Azrieli School of Architecture & Urbanism professors at three separate emotion-filled ceremonies. She said the blankets were handcrafted “with love” by a mother and daughter, who had attended the vacant Muskowekwan Indian Residential School.
“I’m so honoured to work with Carleton University and every spirit that was with us on this journey,” she says. “There is absolutely nothing more important than reconciliation and creating those spaces of healing, understanding, compassion, and empathy.”
After first visiting Muskowekwan in 2018, Dr. Fai returned with a team in 2019 to digitally record the interior and exterior of the building. The recording was used to develop a detailed building information model. That model is now being used by the architecture and engineering consultants working with the community to transform the school.
Fortin had made the residential school the focus of the 2019 third-year Conservation & Sustainability studio. Shortly afterward, Mountain inherited the studio, in which students explored possibilities for the adaptive reuse of the building, now a National Historic Site.
The first ceremony took place on February 23 in Ottawa. A delegation from the Muskowekwan Nation was in town to do research at the Library and Archives Canada on land claim issues and the identities of lost children at the residential school.
Mountain met with them at a restaurant. Wolfe arrived with a large package. “They opened it, and it was there, very quietly and informally, that she presented and wrapped me with the Star Blanket,” he recalls. She was assisted by Danica Mitric, a former student who was part of the 2019 studio group.
“It is all very humbling,” says Mountain. “We are just doing the work we are meant to do.”
The blankets for Fortin and Fai were left in Mountain’s care and he went on to arrange their subsequent presentations, with Wolfe joining by Zoom from Saskatchewan.
Fortin received her blanket — designed with a radiating, luminous star, framed by a blue background and bordered by the firmament — on February 26 in Room 509 of Architecture Building during her design studio class.
Wolfe explained that the Star Blanket is conferred “to honour, protect, and celebrate the individual.” While she spoke, a student unfolded the blanket and placed it on Fortin’s shoulders.
“I was overwhelmed with emotions as tears of joy and appreciation ran down my cheeks,” recalls Fortin. “The Star Blanket holds a significance that transcends mere materiality — it embodies profound meaning and symbolism, enveloping me in warmth, comfort, and a deep sense of well-being.
“The generosity of the community in sharing their culture and traditions has touched me deeply,” she says. “It is an immense honour and a humbling experience to be included in the reconciliation project within the Muskowekwan First Nation.”
Lastly, Fai was presented with a blanket on May 15 at the Carleton Immersive Media Studio (CIMS), where he is the director. “Thank you from every part of me for walking with us and creating these spaces of healing,” Wolfe said in her address.
“It’s possibly the greatest honour of my life,” says Fai. “The experience was emotionally overwhelming. Vanessa’s words were so moving. I couldn’t speak. Just cry.”