For the communities in and around Lytton, charting a path to recovery requires navigating multiple stories about the meaning of the fire and the future of the town. While politicians and media alike were quick to cast the event as a climate change event, for locals this story carried implications that delayed rebuilding and raised costs. By contrast, longstanding approaches to adaptation and self-definition in the community, exemplified in a collection of Anglican commemorative plates curated by community members, provide different ways to imagine and create a future together from the region’s histories. Lytton’s cultural collections and the stories people tell about them can provide a basis for the process of imagining Lytton’s future amidst the myriad strands of its past. Collecting cultural objects and telling stories becomes a lens for transforming how recovery takes place, and for amplifying local frameworks and community priorities for imagining their own futures in the wake of disruption.

Archival Ecologies is created and hosted by Jayme Collins. It's a production of Blue Lab at Princeton University.

Richard Forrest, steward of the Lytton Museum and Archives, reflects on the devastating losses sustained by the municipal repository. With a collection predominantly composed of paper photographs, ledgers, and other documents, very little survived the fire at the Lytton Museum and Archives. For Richard, the importance of these materials lay in their ability to tell stories about daily life in the area across centuries. In the wake of the losses, Richard contemplates the futures of collections in digitized records and photographs, and 3-D printed copies of objects.

Archival Ecologies is created and hosted by Jayme Collins. It's a production of Blue Lab at Princeton University.

Nlaka’pamux basket makers Judy Hanna and Peter Sam recount their processes of basket making, how they learned the craft, and share their hopes for the continuation of basketry traditions in their community.

Archival Ecologies is created and hosted by Jayme Collins. It's a production of Blue Lab at Princeton University. Sound design by Sam Riddell and Jayme Collins. Mixing by Sam Riddell.