Blog post on this project. Free poster of Canadian bathroom signs poster available.

To flush or not to flush?

With the introduction of automatic toilet flushing a few years ago, informal signs posted in public bathrooms now often remind adults to flush the toilet. Or else?

Automatic taps, no touch soap pumps, and high-tech towel dispensers — did any of us ask for this technology? IT seeps into even the most intimate moments of our lives, if we want to or not.

In 2016, in collaboration with family, friends, and by posting on social media, I gathered dozens of bathroom signs from across Canada.

From Peggy’s Cove to the Parliamentary Library bathrooms in Ottawa; from to the faculty club of  U of T to a barn in the BC Interior; and from Victoria, BC, to Montreal, Canadians are instructed to behave in the bathroom in both official languages.

Then the project expanded to include some ol’ fashioned Canadiana such as the tricky images below.

See a selection of the signs here.