The west Coast TAFE Trades North, trade training facility is located on a remnant portion of the Clarkson Community High School’s site on Connolly Drive.
The facility contains 4 600m2 workshops. They contain electrical, metals and carpentry and joinery facilities.
The artwork for the site was commissioned by the Department of Building Management and Works Western Australia. It spans the length of the 3 workshops that face Connolly Drive a distance of approximately 80 linear metres.

The overall form is based on the forms of ribbons that are produced when using a hand plane on a length of timber. The materials used however are Cor-10 steel, in this it makes reference to the trades that use timber and those that use steel. The ribbon pieces are installed in several sections along the length of the building each section measuring between three and eight metres in length. They are ordered in such a way that they give the illusion of a single ribbon disappearing and resurfacing from the finished ground level.
My intention was that the ribbon form would help to represent aspects of the trades that were more random in creativity and subtle in form. In this way I feel that both the building and the artwork together are a symbolic representation of all aspects of the trades.

The thematic direction of this artwork was initially based on the educational and personal growth one experiences as an apprentice of the trades and had a strong reference to assembly and construction by including half built and incomplete sections creating a linear narrative that followed the construction process. However since this idea was outweighed by the importance for the artwork to compliment the building a complete folding ribbon form was decided upon. It still has a linear narrative however in that it increases in size as it travels the length the building and finishes with a climactic height of 5.2 metres for the final piece.