At first glance, the canoe paddles of Toronto designer Natasha Wittke resemble the feather fletching of an arrow – a result of the fine detail she brings to the matte colouring which adorns the blades of solid cherry wood.
“Paddles seem like the most obvious canvas for me,” says Wittke, who sells them through her company Norquay. “Growing up north, I was always on a lake, canoeing all the time.”
Anyone familiar with indigenous art will see it in Wittke’s work, which brings a flair of Canadiana to the craft of paddlemaking. At a young age, growing up in Sudbury, her stepgrandfather introduced her to the art of Norval Morrisseau, Jackson Beardy and Carl Ray, among others. In hindsight, she says, their styles had a profound effect on the way she takes to her paddles with clean lines and bursts of colour.
“I love playing with colour, mixing it, creating contrast and putting things together that you wouldn’t think would go together,” says Wittke, whose most popular designs inspired names such as summer sky, hunter, honour, Earth and ember. “When they do come together in the right balance [it’s] amazing.”
Wittke launched Norquay about three years ago in Montreal before moving to Toronto last July. The company is small: She has an assistant and two other people are on call if she needs a hand. The paddles were initially intended for decorative purposes only. (“They’re art pieces first,” she says.) But this year, she is selling water-ready versions that were tested in the rugged waters of Algonquin Provincial Park.
Wittke selects her paddles – sourced from a craftsperson in Northern Ontario – with an eye on the grain, looking at the way it runs down the length of a blade, at how it flows around knots like water. For her, wood grain is art in and of itself.
“The ones that have a lot of movement, I like to use for paddles that have a lot of wood exposure; the ones that have a lot of straight lines I usually cover up with colour,” Wittke says.
“You have to celebrate those wood grains – they’re just too beautiful to hide under paint.”
Norquay artisan painted paddles, $315-$385. norquayco.com