The Green Iguana Glassworks

The Green Iguana Glassworks is often mistaken for a new age shop. “A couple times a year, people come in and ask me if I’m selling healing crystals,” says owner Darrell Dorsk. It’s a reasonable question, considering the colourful mural that adorns the shop’s exterior façade. The mural was the result of a shoot for the 2001 film Serendipity starring John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale, as the shop was made to look like a new age store in San Francisco. “Afterwards, the art director said, ‘Do you want us to paint it back?’ Off-white like the others,” he remembers. “And I said, ‘Are you crazy?’ But I knew it would appeal to people who have a belief in magical thinking.”

Darrell jokes that instead of healing crystals, he sells “trick sand.” A small enclave on the main floor displays a collection of stunning glassworks like vases, vials and pipes from over 30 artisans, many of which hail from the Ottawa Valley and Quebec. Adorning nearly every surface of open wall in The Green Iguana are Darrel’s hand-framed prints, images that he’s collected over the years of everything imaginable: old advertisements, clippings from art books, posters and postcards. “I have enough stuff to frame for another 40 years,” he says with a laugh.