{"id":163127,"date":"2024-05-23T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-23T20:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=163127"},"modified":"2024-06-07T14:05:09","modified_gmt":"2024-06-07T18:05:09","slug":"make-way-for-ducklings-and-the-bates-class-of-2024-ivy-stone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2024\/05\/23\/make-way-for-ducklings-and-the-bates-class-of-2024-ivy-stone\/","title":{"rendered":"Make way for ducklings and the Bates Class of 2024 ivy stone"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Amelia Hawkins \u201924 of Sun Valley, Idaho, wants her Bates classmates to graduate with a sense of hope, especially since many of their high school graduations four years ago were drive-by events (if that), and their first year at Bates was under COVID protocols that made spending time together tough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Amelia
Amelia Hawkins \u201924 of Sun Valley, Idaho, holds the 2024 ivy stone she designed, as Bates mason Ron Tardif prepares for its installation along the brick foundation of Pettengill Hall on May 22, 2024. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

So Hawkins, a Bates studio arts major, created a design for their traditional ivy stone that everyone can rally around: the ducks at Lake Andrews. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hawkins also added ducklings, to symbolize hope and promise. Then she finished off her sketch with the class year \u2014 2024 \u2014 fashioned into ripples floating away from the duck\u2019s paddling webbed feet, as if sending reverberations of her positive message into the future. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have always been in love with the ivy stones around campus and the different designs and how they\u2019ve changed over time,\u201d said Hawkins. \u201cSome have buildings, and those are cool, but I wanted to do something new that I hadn\u2019t seen \u2014 yet also something everyone sees. I immediately thought of the ducks at the Puddle.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Amelia
Another year, another Bates ivy stone for Ron Tardif, a mason with Facility Services. Here, he begins installing the 2024 stone along the brick foundation of Pettengill Hall on May 22, 2024. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Around 7:30 on Wednesday morning, Ron Tardif, a Bates mason with Facility Services, began his work installing the stone, first by drilling a square hole in the brick. Soon, Hawkins arrived. Despite having been up very late the night before with her friends \u2014 it being Senior Week and all \u2014 she wanted to see the installation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tardif appreciated the senior’s pluck and gumption. \u201cShe\u2019s definitely mason material!\u201d he boomed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A mason of 35 years, Tardif not only loves the art of masonry, but also teaching others his craft. So Tardif encouraged Hawkins to help out. At first reluctant, she soon crouched down and helped plaster the interior sides of the empty hole with mortar. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPeople will see me doing something and come over and start asking questions. The best way to answer is: \u2018Here, try it,\u2019\u201d Tardif said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Bates mason Ron Tardif (left) teaches Amelia Hawkins how to plaster the area around her ivy stone. “She’s definitely mason material,” Tardif boomed. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The ivy stone tradition at Bates dates to 1878, when the juniors of the Class of 1879 installed their class stone on Hathorn Hall and planted a sprig of ivy below it. (Back then, ivy stones were installed in the junior year. And now, ivy is no longer planted.)\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not surprising, ivy motifs as well as depictions of Hathorn Hall and its bell tower have been popular subjects through the years. Occasionally, students have brought the outside world into their stone design. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Class of 1946\u2019s stone, installed in spring 1945, pays homage to the U.S. Navy, which had sailors stationed at Bates during World War II. The Class of 2021 stone features a raised fist as a symbol of Black Lives Matter, and a mask to suggest the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Amelia
Bates mason Ron Tardif sets the Class of 2024 ivy stone into place on May 22, 2024. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Until now, no stone depicts any kind of pastoral or natural scene. And that\u2019s right in Hawkins\u2019 wheelhouse. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI always tend to focus on nature. I\u2019m drawn to nature,\u201d says Hawkins, who will head to San Francisco to work as a designer at Pottery Barn Kids after graduation. \u201cI did my whole senior thesis on the forest fires in Idaho<\/a>,\u201d capturing the cycle of fire and regrowth in her oil paintings. \u201cIt is an amazing cycle that captivates me every year.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ducks begetting ducklings is another kind of cycle, and another way to feel hopeful, she says \u2014 \u201chope for our class, because our class has gone through a lot.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Amelia
The ivy stone that Amelia Hawkins \u201924 created depicts a duck with ducklings in Lake Andrews, symbolizing hope and promise during uncertain times. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

And with so much going on in the world right now, \u201cI thought this was something everyone could relate to and enjoy in some way. I\u2019ve always wanted to design the ivy stone and I\u2019m thrilled that I get to have my artwork up here forever.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amelia Hawkins \u201924 wants her Bates classmates to graduate with a sense of hope, so she created an ivy stone design everyone can rally around: the ducks at Lake Andrews.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1705,"featured_media":163246,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[133,11012],"tags":[12348,4506],"class_list":["post-163127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-creativity","category-student-life","tag-commencement-2024","tag-ivy-stone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1705"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163127"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163127\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":163702,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163127\/revisions\/163702"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/163246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}