figure 1. Pages from 1899–1900 Eaton’s Catalogue.
Everyday experience in Canada at the beginning of the 20th century often—if not always—included interaction with the Eaton’s mail order catalogue. This catalogue, a formidable paradigm-shifting element in Canadian daily life beginning in 1884, conflated consumerism with concepts of modernism, progress, and the duty of citizens to contribute to their nation’s economic well-being. In her book Retail Nation, Donica Belisle connects the rise of mass retail enterprise and a new attitude towards consumerism to the early formation of Canada as a modern nation, while emphasizing the progression of innovation through “three realms of the marketplace, namely, production, distribution, and consumption” [1]. If the role that department stores and their catalogues play is academically and historically vital in the nation building history of Canada, why do we downplay the importance of everyday, popular culture, and household items that are often ignored in design histories or taken for granted? Canadian design was, and still remains, an intrinsic aspect in the manufacture, production, distribution, and promotion of these goods on display in department stores and throughout their mail-order catalogues. The cultural influence that Eaton’s exerted on Western Canada in particular could not have been accomplished without a large number of product designers, graphic designers and illustrators, architects, and—while they may not have been described as such in their own time—systems designers, who were able to orchestrate and build supply and distribution networks with a very limited rail and roadway system.
“Authenticity is to be understood as an inherent quality” [8]. Defining what an authentic and significant moment in Canadian design history might be requires a definition of authenticity as a term, and the context in which we might attribute it. While narratives and anecdotes supplied by those who interacted with the Eaton’s catalogue may describe an authentic experience, validation and recognition from academics and designers is necessary to create a unified practice of identifying and sharing information. As Charles Lindhom states, “authenticity gathers people together in collectives that are felt to be real, essential, and vital, providing participants with meaning, unity, and a surpassing sense of belonging” [5]. Along with other academics who have focused on the concept of authenticity, Lindholm references Lionel Trilling who writes that notions of authenticity grew out of concepts of sincerity. Relating authenticity to sincerity is a complicated task, however, because it implies that in order to achieve authenticity we must qualify it through experiential terms, rather than confirm it through a quantifiable—and therefore verifiable—method. The rise of scientific reasoning in the modern era meant that collected data soon became the prime evidence to confirm perceptions of authenticity, relegating notions of intuition and emotion to irrelevancy. Within this context, Canada emerged from the 19th century as a newly unified nation, emphasizing the importance of production and consumption in modern culture. “Historians have paid substantial attention to some aspects of modernization, especially urbanization, industrialization, and the expansion of
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ACHIEVING AUTHENTICIT Y