IN PHOTOS Northern lights dance across the night sky in southern Ont.
From London, to Mildmay, Collingwood and St. Thomas, here are some highlights of Friday night and Saturday morning's northern lights display.
When 1990s suede fringe jackets started making a comeback last year, U.K.-based vintage clothing company Glass Onion Vintage decided to order four tonnes of suede from a supplier in the United States.
Along with that shipment came a once-in-a lifetime discovery.
The delivery was made to its warehouse, where a total of 3.5 million items of recycled clothing are found on any given day. Occasionally staff will unearth a gem some customers will pay good money for, but what staff member Sophie Upson found, Glass Onion Vintage refuses to sell.
Upson was tasked with going through those suede items to inspect the quality and determine which ones could be resold or redesigned.
It took her a week to get through it all and by then, and after 12 years mastering her skills, she knew exactly the texture she was looking for.
“That is old,” she said to herself when she pulled out what turned to be a Canadian Indigenous jacket. It’s too elaborate to be a stage prop, she thought, as she looked inside the pockets.
“When they’ve got this linen-y fabric inside, it could be 1950s, could be '40s,” she explained to CTV News. But Upson was off by about century.
She told her boss, John Hickling, he had to come and see it.
“It’s beyond what I know,” Upson remarked.
Whereas other historic items have been auctioned off, this jacket will have a different fate.
“I want to find out as much about it as I possibly can,” Hickling told CTV News. “We want to do the right thing by the piece of clothing.”
Alice Leadbetter, head of marketing, then took the lead. She uploaded a video to TikTok and woke up the next day to half a million views and a messages from Canadian experts asking specific question about the pattern of the bead work, the stitching and the feel of the suede: is it soft or dense?
After six months, they’ve pieced together this much: “We now feel very confident that the jacket is either Metis or Cree (…) most likely from Alberta or Manitoba,” she said.
Leadbetter was told that the olive green chain stitch on the pocket is a technique that was taught in schools in the Red River region in pre-1850s. She was also told this was a hunting jacket.
“Some museums have suggested this was created by an artist, potentially for a family member or a fur trader,” she added.
The jacket is handcrafted with astonishing detail, only adding to the historical significance.
“We’re still looking for answers to narrow down it even further in hopes of finding the community it came from,” said Leadbetter, who spends hours answering emails from experts asking for more pictures.
(Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
Like millions of other items in this warehouse, the jacket would have been donated to a thrift store, discarded, and then sold to a recycling company in the United States.
(Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
“From there it would have been baled to different parts of the world, so maybe Pakistan, maybe Thailand,” explained Hickling.
(Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
Incredibly, it would have also made its way back to the U.S. to the vintage dealer that supplied this company, in a little English market town, with the suede it ordered.
(Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
“The thought of the full journey, where it’s come from in history, the recycling process, the fact that’s it’s ended up in South Yorkshire, that our skilled sorters have found it,” Hickling said, “it added to its story.”
A suede jacket is seen inside the Glass Onion Vintage warehouse. (Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
Now it’s a question of completing the journey back to its original home.
(Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
(Daniele Hamamdjian / CTV News)
From London, to Mildmay, Collingwood and St. Thomas, here are some highlights of Friday night and Saturday morning's northern lights display.
A cyclist turned herself in and received a fine after striking a four-year-old girl who was crossing the street to catch a school bus.
For decades, North Bay, Ontario's water supply has harboured chemicals associated with liver and developmental issues, cancer and complications with pregnancy. It's far from the only city with that problem.
The Netherlands' contestant in the Eurovision Song Contest was dramatically expelled from competition hours before Saturday's final of the pan-continental pop competition, which has been rattled by protests over the participation of Israel.
The rolling hills leading to the hamlet of Rosebud are dotted with sprawling farms and cattle pastures -- and a sign sporting a simple message: No Race Track.
In the quiet and leafy Vancouver neighbourhood of South Cambie, best known for its botanical garden, playoff fever is about to set in.
Evan Bouchard scored 5:38 into overtime and the Edmonton Oilers bounced back for a 4-3 win over the Vancouver Canucks in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs on Friday.
Biden wants the 2024 election to be a referendum on Trump's record and plans, but he also wants voters to look favourably on his own policies and actions
Irresponsibly using a credit card can land you in financial trouble, but personal finance columnist Christopher Liew says when used properly, it can be a powerful wealth-building tool that can help grow your credit profile and create new opportunities.
A family of fifth generation farmers from Ituna, Sask. are trying to find answers after discovering several strange objects lying on their land.
A Listowel, Ont. man, drafted by the Hamilton Tigercats last week, is also getting looks from the NFL, despite only playing 27 games of football in his life.
A small Ajax dessert shop that recently received a glowing review from celebrity food critic Keith Lee is being forced to move after a zoning complaint was made following the social media influencer’s visit last month.
The Canada Science and Technology Museum is inviting visitors to explore their poop. A new exhibition opens at the Ottawa museum on Friday called, 'Oh Crap! Rethinking human waste.'
The Regina Police Service says it is the first in Saskatchewan and possibly Canada to implement new technology in its detention facility that will offer real-time monitoring of detainees’ vital health metrics.
The stakes have been set for a bet between Vancouver and Edmonton's mayors on who will win Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
A grieving mother is hosting a helmet drive in the hopes of protecting children on Manitoba First Nations from a similar tragedy that killed her daughter.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
A P.E.I. lighthouse and a New Brunswick river are being honoured in a Canada Post series.