Braybrook and its people celebrated through textile art

Published on 05 June 2025

A community-engaged arts residency by artist Phong Chi Lai and supported by Council invites locals to contribute to the final touches of a collaborative textile banner that celebrates the creativity of our community and honours the natural environment.

Over a three-month period, the project Slow colour, community and wellbeing invited the Braybrook and wider Maribyrnong community to connect and engage with each other in the process of making a collaborative textile banner.

This month, the community is invited to come along to two final workshops on 7 and 21 June, where they can contribute their creativity to the banner.

Vietnamese-Australian textile artist Phong Chi Lai, of Studio PCL, worked with a dedicated group of residents over all stages of the project teaching skills such as dyeing, mending, and patchwork sewing. Once the textile banner was constructed from patchwork squares, the community were invited to contribute ideas for a slogan that summed up what living in Braybrook means to them.

In the upcoming workshops in June, attendees will applique this slogan onto the collaboratively-made banner.

City of Maribyrnong Mayor, Cr Pradeep Tiwari, said the Slow colour, community and wellbeing project was an inspiring example of how the Braybrook Community-Engaged Artist Residency Program provides the community with pathways to creative expression and connection.

“It is meaningful to see the community getting involved in these sorts of projects, which allow people to connect with each other over a creative project, and share their unique perspectives on life in Melbourne’s west,” said Mayor Tiwari.

Phong said, “Community members created patchwork squares out of textiles that we dyed with natural materials like plants, flowers and food waste. Participants appreciated the opportunity to engage in environmentally-friendly creativity, using natural dyes and giving second-hand textiles a new life.”

“In May, these squares were constructed into a patchwork banner that brought together their individual creative perspective in an original, cohesive way. Workshops and drop-in events were accessible for all skill levels, including seasoned quilters and people newer to textiles,” added Phong.

The finished artwork will act as a shared record of the Braybrook community and the natural surroundings and will be installed prominently at Braybrook Community Hub for all to enjoy.

The Braybrook Community Textile Banner will be installed in August 2025. For more information, visit: Community-Engaged Artist in Residence - Maribyrnong Council Arts and Culture

Community Banner Making by Phong Chi Lai:

Drop in during open studio sessions to have a chat, try some hand sewing, and help with appliqueing the banner logo.

10am-1pm, 7 and 21 June

Braybrook Community Hub, 107-109 Churchill Avenue, Braybrook

More information

About the Braybrook Community-Engaged Artist Residency Program

Since 2018, Council has embedded a community-engaged artist into the Braybrook Community Hub. This program is designed to deepen the creative engagement of the community and include them as fellow artists in the co-creation of a creative work.

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