St John WA Great Southern training uniforms to receive colourful Noongar makeover

The training uniforms for the St John WA Albany sub-centre, and sub-centres across the Great Southern, will soon be decked out in colourful whales and turtles from Menang Noongar artist Kiya Watt. Watt said the opportunity to work with St John WA to design new training uniforms was an amazing experience. “I was so honoured and excited because I’ve been painting for a while and I’ve just moved back to Albany, so I was like ‘wow this is a great opportunity’,” she said. “They (St John) loved the yakkans I do, and they’re very spiritual to my dreaming spirit, and so it worked perfectly. “Visually it all just came together really well and represented all of the Great Southern.” St John WA acting regional manager Sam Ehrlich said the new training uniforms are part of St John WA’s reconciliation plan at a local Great Southern level. Great Southern regional administration co-ordinator Andrea White said the artwork is representative of the region as a whole and acts as a unifier between St John centres. “It’s a sort of sense of our region as a whole because it’s beautiful,” she said. “It’s all the different parts of our region and incorporates all of our sub-centres whether they’re up in Katanning or along the coastline. “Not only do we have a WA-wide action plan we’ve got a local level where we’re able to do things like this that are very specific to our local community.”