A back-to-nature birchbark-basket warming hut Winnipeg Free Press [Video]

Jaimie Isaac and Suzanne Morrissette’s work will soon grace the Nestaweya River Trail.

They are the invited artists for this year’s Warming Huts competition, the flagship annual event that attracted 140 submissions from designers and architects across the world this year.

Entitled Rosemary Skool, the pair’s hut, representing a birchbark basket, will take shape from snow and clay bricks sourced from the river.

“The organic materials used to build the hut will return to the river with the spring melt,” says Morrissette. “An ephemeral evolution.”

Their hut is one of six that people will be able to enjoy by February. For the past 15 winters, ice skaters, couples and families sauntering on the frozen Red and Assiniboine rivers have stopped to warm and immerse themselves inside these compact architectural worlds.

“It was really a no-brainer in some respects,” says Zachary …