My baba was many things. An avid gardener. Prolific cross-stitcher. And a Ukrainian refugee.
She was also the inspiration behind my collaboration with 6-OH-4 Clothing in support of Canadian Red Cross relief efforts in Ukraine.
Sunflowers are such a beautiful metaphor – they stand strong, they stand together and they turn their faces toward the light. To me, they feel hopeful. I wanted the sunflower to have the look of the cross-stitch needlework my baba used to make. So I drew several versions of the graphic and tested them out. I was originally thinking it was going to be multicoloured on a white background so I used the blue of the Ukrainian flag for the stem and yellow for the petals, as modelled by Mike Lyall of 6-OH-4 (above).
The Mike proposed doing yellow on blue, which had way more impact. But I didn’t love the graphic itself so I did some very lofi photoshopping (doodling on my iPhone) to reverse the middle of the sunflower, which is what would eventually become the heart.
By ordering this shirt (which you can do here), you’re facilitating help and healing in some of the hardest-hit regions of Ukraine: The net proceeds from every purchase goes to the Canadian Red Cross for humanitarian aid.
