Farine Five Roses
Fifteen-foot rooftop neon letters spelling a flour brand, blinking over the harbor since the late nineteen forties.
This guide to the Farine Five Roses sign in Montreal follows what happened when the flour brand's owners sold to Smuckers in 2006 and someone switched off the rooftop letters that had blinked over the harbor since 1948. You'll hear how a Concordia professor named Matt Soar, who already photographed corporate logos around the city, refused to let the sign go dark and turned its fifteen letters into invented word games he called Farinagrams. Listen for how Heritage Montreal joined the campaign, even without official heritage status behind it. Look up to see the letters still missing the word FLOUR, scrubbed away by language law in 1977.
Audio guides are written and narrated by AI.