My Plate Your Plate

Foodcarts that bring refugee and asylum seeker communities together with
Inner West residents to swap recipes and stories about food and culture.

My Plate, Your Plate is a storytelling project that brought diverse communities together to cook, swap recipes and stories and design a pair of interactive food carts to engage the broader public. The project builds relationships between local residents and people from refugee and asylum seeker backgrounds, breaking down social isolation, building cultural awareness and solidarity. The project was partnership between the Inner West Council, Community Refugee Welcome, Settlement Services International, Living Arts and a collection of local artists (see full credits below).

The Co-design process:
Cooking, inviting folks to share the lesser known stories and sketching over lunch

A diverse group of residents met each week the Refugee Welcome centre in Callan park, each session two people cooked (one main, one dessert) as the rest of us gathered in the kitchen watching closely, we built friendships and learnt great recipes from across the world.

And then we ate together and over lunch people shared stories about the recipes and their connection to family, special occasions and important places in their life. These were recorded and edited into a series of audio stories to be played through the carts.

During these gatherings we also designed the food carts, we spoke about the experience we wanted to create and invited the group to share pictures of market stalls, furniture and patterns form their home country. We combined these diverse elements and designed two carts that meet, symbolising my plate, your plate, and the exchange that happens when the two come together.

We also designed a range of graphics to be printed on parts of the food carts. This included logos that illustrated two meals that were cooked during the workshops (Including Aashe Rashteh, illustrated below) and patterns for the handles - one referencing the Australian bush and the other referencing tiles that people remember being in restaurants in Iran.

Building the carts:
Continuing to connect and share through collaborative making

The design was refined, build in CAD and CNC cut in ply, ready for construction.

The carts were then constructed together with a number of the participants.

And finally the fabric awning was designed by Elham, one of the Persian women involved, and made by the rest of group.

The finished carts as a storytelling installation

The carts are now roving community events where they carts create space for the wider community to come and meet members of the group, sit at the
carts, try a recipe, and listen to the stories that were recorded during the project - creating a storytelling experience that delights all the senses.

Recipe cards

We also created a range of cards to share the community recipes - Download the set HERE

Credits:

Inner West Council and the Community Refugee Welcome Centre: Producing and hosting
Raffaela, Community Arts Project Officer at IWC: Project creator and lead
The incredible community members involved: contributing recipes, stories and co-designing and making the carts
Tasman Munro: leading the co-design and construction of the food carts and illustration of artwork and recipe cards.
Lucinda and Mehran for assisting with the build
Elham: Master sewer for leading the design and sewing of the fabric awning
Caitlin Gibson: Recording and producing the audio stories
Moones: Coordination at the Community Refugee Welcome Centre