GRIPBlock Wall

The GRIPBlock Wall @ stackt is a project that is part of the Design Collection @ stackt. stackt market is an official festival hub for DesignTO, the annual art and design festival that brings together art lovers throughout the GTA – it’s one of over 100 exhibitions and events forming Toronto’s design week, January 22–31, 2021. Located at Toronto’s innovative stackt market container marketplace, the GRIPBlock Wall @ stackt Exhibition embodies the spirit of its hosts location, employing reusable and modular bricks to form functional structures that can be repurposed as needed and as creativity demands.

Assembled in less than a day from over 2,600 “GRIP Blocks”, the wall is the latest structure erected by Toronto’s own GRIPMetal Inc. that is beginning to dot Toronto’s landscape. The wooden blocks, first employed to create temporary walls for social distancing, are finding their way into downtown restaurants at Locals Only and the fantastic curved walls at Oretta both on King St. W. – a mere ten minute walk from the stackt market, and they now even surround the company’s head office in Scarborough.

While creating art from building blocks isn’t necessarily new, the stackt installation is built for both form, and function. Part installation, part performance – passerby can watch as the installation is erected in a matter of hours, and then enjoy the warm, wind-free enclosure while viewing works from some of Toronto’s latest up and coming designers.

The blocks themselves will also serve as a backdrop to original design. While the concepts haven’t been finalized, GRIPMetal hopes the installation can be a fixture at the market through the spring, keeping visitors warm, welcomed and engaged in design.