An Installation for the Workforce Pipeline Summit

The Workforce Pipeline Summit, held on March 18 at Washtenaw Community College, focused on engaging underserved groups in Michigan’s workforce. Our agency created a visual and multi-sensory experience for the event’s entrance.

The term “Workforce Pipeline” is often used to describe the flow of individuals into various job roles, but it can feel impersonal and mechanistic, reducing people to mere cogs in an industrial machine. To counteract this perspective, we aimed to illuminate the vibrant, tender and growing human essence of this “pipeline.”

We cut copper pipes of different lengths, drilled holes in each and installed a tiny tube of water to sustain bits of fresh eucalyptus and other greenery. These vases were hung in flocks from the ceiling and walls of the entrance to the  conference.

Each pipe contained a rolled piece of paper that read:

“Toward a vision of work
that sustains and supports—
and gives us equal
opportunities for individual
and collective growth.”

After the event, attendees could purchase the vases, with proceeds benefiting SEMIS Coalition, a place-based education organization, and We the People Opportunity Farm, a working farm which provides assistance and training to formerly incarcerated community members.