FLEET: Foreshore

September 3 - November 14, 2026

We are excited to welcome Yolonda Skelton to FLEET: Foreshore! During her visit to FLEET, in Skelton's words "FLEET will serve as an extension of my studio as I mentor Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week designer mentees and create my 2026 collection, The Earth Remembers. Through garment construction, storytelling, sustainable design, community engagement, studio practice, discussions, and information exchange, we will explore upcycled leathers, silks, wools, and reclaimed materials, incorporating porcupine quills, caribou tufting, and beadwork. Animal symbology will celebrate the Earth and interconnected relationships among humans, animals, and land. FLEET and I will work in partnership, guided by Respect, Relevance, Reciprocity, and Responsibility, while “Yo-Lon-da-fying” fifteen garments for the 2026 VIFW."

Sunday November 1st: Community Drop-In Day

Drop in anytime between noon - 3pm - Meet the artist and visit the FLEET studio! FREE, everyone welcome.‍ Community Drop-In Days are timed with our neighbours' Pay What You Can days: The Museum of Vancouver, The Vancouver Maritime Museum, and the HR MacMillan Space Centre.

(Note: Love Songs to End Colonization is doing a short residency in FLEET: Foreshore from October 1-8th, with a public performance on October 6th.)

Location: FLEET: Foreshore is located at 1100 Chestnut Street in Vancouver near The H.R. MacMillan Space Centre’s Observatory (“Gordon Southam Observatory”) The Museum of Vancouver, and the Sen̓áḵw Towers. In “Vanier Park”.

‍Bio

Yolonda Skelton (Jackson) Sugiit Lukxs (Sug-iit-looks) is a First Nations multidisciplinary artist, fashion creator, and theatre, film, ballet costume designer from the Gitxsan Nation, based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Her practice weaves fashion, film, ballet, and stage storytelling into wearable narratives rooted in water protection, keystone species, and reconciliation healing, using animal symbolism to expand audiences’ relationships with land, memory, and responsibility. Coming from designing within the international Indigenous fashion community, she has presented collections at Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week, Indigenous Fashion Week Toronto, Southwestern Association for American Indian Arts, and Paris.

Her costume design and artistic work spans celebrated theatre productions, screen credits, and live performance. For theatre, Beautiful Scars (Theater Aquarius, National Arts Centre) and The Secret to Good Tea (Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre, NAC) Rez Gas (Capitol Theatre), Rose (NAC). For ballet, Winterbourn, (Vancouver Play House). Her film/TV work includes Lay Down Your Heart (NFB), assistant costume design feature film Bones of Crows, and WaaPaKe (NFB) alongside Angela’s Shadow. She is also engaged in new documentary and feature projects with releases scheduled for 2026-2027.

As a fashion exhibitor, Skelton has shown work through community-rooted collaborations and museum contexts, including projects with the University of Victoria’s Legacy Art Gallery, a Banff residency exhibition, and group exhibitions such as Generation to Generation (American Museum of Natural History) Art of Indigenous Fashion at IAIA museum, and Bright Futures at the Bill Reid Gallery. Her most recent installation and fashion show, Intertwined Threads, at Sacred Fire Productions in Montreal. Skelton’s company Sugiit Lukxs Designs—centers eco-conscious materials and ethical practice, honoring Indigenous heritage through design.