Unceded: Land and design sovereignty
what do you say to a non indigenous journalist that is apologetic for not including any building you have designed in her latest article because it does not have “that look” that the non indigenous magazine editors and publishers are looking for … leaving you thinking that you have to justify your own existence to her.1
—luugigyoo patrick stewart (Nisga’a architect)
Despite significant increases in demographic diversity made visible in the global design community in recent years, the work of First Nations, Métis and Inuit architects in Canada has been historically invisible outside of the very rarest exceptions, such as the iconic works of Blackfoot architect and Anishinaabe Elder Douglas Cardinal. This should not be surprising, given that until 1961, a professional education such as architecture required one to renounce their Indigenous rights as part of the “compulsory enfranchisement” section of the Canadian Indian Act. Essentially, in order to be an architect, you needed to be
