‘Of all the simple pleasures in the world, none are so basic , so fundamental, to the human experience as those found in the kitchen: food, family, camaraderie, ritual.’

 

Susannah Seton

Simple Pleasures of the Kitchen, 2005

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Our Plated Project is an archival project celebrating the dinner plates at the core of our meal memories and dining rituals.

 

Inspired by my mother's wedding trousseau dinner set and its journey of use over the last thirty years, I chose to study and explore the lives of similar plates in people's personal histories across the world.

This ongoing investigation has taken the form of a digital archive which is host to a submission based section with creative responses to dinner plates, and a participatory mobile illustration workshop held in unsuspecting public locations.  

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Project Works

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This section is home to a number of  'projects' created by people with stories to share, in response to the role a certain plate has played in their lives.  There are stories, recipes, photographs, and audio clips, all authentic as well as editorial, curated in ways that our readers can connect the meal memories shared here with their own.

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Plated Designs

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The Plated Workshop is a way to encourage people to recreate the pattern of a plate that holds special significance for them. This archive shares photographs of the participants with their plate drawings and snippets of stories behind them. 

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On the whole, this project is for those who have held onto or wanted to preserve personal histories via this particular material object.

 

Moments with family, friends, strangers in a new place, in homes away from home, and so many more are built around meals and rituals with plates as the quiet accessories behind the memories. I invite you to discover the beauty of these moments with the project, and should any of them tug on some of your own plate memories, I look forward to hearing about them! 

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– Kanishka Gupta