The Door Is Always Open is a door stop carved from 10,000-year-old Ancient Red Gum — a functional object that doubles as a meditation on deep time, material memory, and what it means to work with Australian timber.
About This Book
This is not a book. The Door Is Always Open is a limited-edition design object by Melbourne furniture designer and craftsman Damien Wright — part of Bookshop by Uro's curated Souvenir collection. Made from Ancient Red Gum sourced from timber approximately 10,000 years old, each door stop is hand-worked and issued in an edition of twenty. The object asks a deceptively simple question: what happens when a utilitarian form is made from material that carries geological and cultural weight? For those drawn to Australian craft, material investigation, and objects that hold meaning beyond function, this is a rare acquisition.
Key Features
- Limited edition of 20
- Designed by Damien Wright of Wright Studios
- Materials: Ancient Red Gum, approximately 10,000 years old
- Dimensions: 200 x 40 x 35mm
What You'll Discover
- How a functional object can encode histories of place, time, and colonisation through its raw material alone
- Wright's practice of working with timbers outside conventional furniture-making traditions — eucalyptus, desert timbers, and ancient Red Gum among them
- The tension between utility and artefact: a door stop as a cultural object contributed to the tradition of Australian craft
- What it means to hold something shaped by hands from wood that predates European settlement by millennia
About the Author
Damien Wright is an award-winning furniture designer and craftsman with over 30 years of experience, known for his material-led investigations into Australian timbers. His work has been contributed to Australian institutions spanning law, politics, art, and culture. Wright works directly with his hands, using non-traditional timbers — including eucalyptus, desert timbers, and Ancient Red Gum — to surface stories of place, time, colonisation, and belonging.
Specifications
- Format: Design object — limited edition
- Pages: [Details available upon request]
- Dimensions: 200 x 40 x 35mm
- Language: English
- ISBN: [Details available upon request]
- Publisher: [Details available upon request]
- Publication Date: [Details available upon request]
Perfect For: Collectors of Australian craft and design objects, architects and designers with an interest in material culture, and anyone seeking a meaningful, place-specific acquisition. Please note: this item is available for in-store purchase and click-and-collect only — shipping is not available.