Altadena, CA
Greetings from Altadena, California! We have finally created an official postcard mural in our neighborhood of Altadena. The local community was heavily involved in this piece of public art that we’ve worked hard on making a reality since 2020. You can check out the completed mural located at the 2270 North Lake Ave. on the side of Grocery Outlet Altadena
This particular project took close to 2 years to come to fruition. The process involved connecting with many local residents and business owners after we moved to the area in 2020. After working closely with 50+ other communities throughout the country, we applied our experience & knowledge to this mural in our new hometown. Prior to this project, we donated a few other Altadena themed murals to local businesses like Highlight Coffee, Unincorporated Coffee and Altadena Hardware. It turned out to be a great way to introduce ourselves and meet locals during the pandemic in a safe, outdoor environment.
Scouting the Altadena Mural Location
Finding the perfect location for this official Altadena mural was the first challenge. We asked around in neighborhood forums like Beautiful Altadena and Nextdoor. The online community did not disappoint and connected us with a local community activist René Amy along with his signature laugh. He pushed hard for us to get the perfect wall at Grocery Outlet since he was already acquainted with the new owners Sandra and Jose. This location was close to the geographical central point of Altadena and had historical importance to the development of the area. Together, we worked on convincing the corporate and property management to allow us to finally move forward with the project!
Collaborating with the community
Once we had the location secured, the next step was to raise awareness and gather ideas from the community. There’s a big difference between creating true public art and just placing your own fine art in public. We feel that there needs to be dialogue with those who live and work in the area to be able to create something that the community can embrace after it’s completed. Therefore, we started to set up booths at multiple community events like the Farmer’s Markets and the Sip & Shop at Mariposa Junction. In addition, we joined the Altadena Chamber & Civic Association and connected with likeminded local artists at the Altadena Arts Festival. It was a great way to meet locals as we took public votes on what images locals felt best represented Altadena.
Connecting with all the wonderful people in the community made us love our neighborhood even more! We learned more and more about Altadena and its history through different viewpoints. In addition, we even asked for more candid feedback from the local online community via Facebook, Nextdoor & Reddit. Furthermore, we setup an online voting system on our website to take even more votes from those we couldn’t talk to in person. You can see the final results of over 400+ votes below:
Note: The chart above only included imagery with 5+ votes. There were other one-off suggestions that included: Bailian House, Zane Grey House, The Star of Palawoo, Zorthian Ranch & more.
Altadena Fundraising Support
Throughout the winter of 2021-2022, we were able to gather support from sponsors to help cover some of our supply costs. We had donors contribute to a Kickstarter campaign that we created. Special thanks to the major donors who helped make this project a reality: Chase, Carciofi Design, Sherwin Williams, Grocery Outlet Altadena, Altadena Arts, Twenty28 Dentistry and Fine Arts Club of Pasadena. Their kind support was greatly appreciated as a lot of people don’t realize how much supply and equipment costs can add up to even before labor is involved!
We also wanted to thank the various local businesses who supported this project with discounts and meals including: Simon Rentals, Cafe De Leche, Amara Kitchen, Coffee Gallery, Everest, Homestate and Sidepie.
Selected Altadena Imagery
The View up Lake Ave.
An aerial view looking north up Lake Avenue is inside the first two letters A and L. We took a drone shot for reference to try to capture some key buildings as well as the San Gabriel mountains in the distance. We made sure to include the old Mount Lowe railway power station (now Full Circle Thrift) at the intersection of Lake & Calaveras Street. This area was once known as Mountain Junction. It was a popular hub of mountain tourism during its peak and became a central point of Altadena. We had fun painting a “You Are Here” location mark on the side of Grocery Outlet in the mural. There’s also a little tribute to the store Rhythms of the Village across the street with a Pan-African flag on a billboard. Within the “L” we included the Eliot Arts Magnet school which didn’t make the top votes but we worked it in with some strategic placement. Last but not least, we gave our 3 month old (at the time) baby Felix a little shout out on a billboard! This was the most detailed image we have painted so far and you really have to go see it in person to find all the other little hidden elements.
Christmas Tree Lane
Thank you to local photographer Jerry Friedman for allowing us to reference his shots of Christmas Tree Lane at night for the T and A. This attraction is on the National Register of Historic Places and can be found on Santa Rosa Ave. between Altadena Drive and Woodbury Road. The plaque reads: The 135 Deodar Cedar trees were planted in 1885 by the Woodbury Family, the founders of Altadena. First organized by F.C. Nash in 1920, the 'Mile of Christmas Trees' has been strung with 10,000 lights each holiday season through the efforts of volunteers and the Christmas Tree Lane Association. It is the oldest large-scale Christmas lighting spectacle in Southern California. Be sure to come back around Christmas time to check it out!
Altadena’s Iconic Black Artists
Within the D, we painted a portrait of a young Charles White. Many locals are familiar with Charles White Park but not many people seem to know who he was or what he looked like for that matter. “Who’s the guy in the D?” was the most asked question as we were painting! For those who don’t know, Charles White was a local painter known for his chronicling of African American related subjects in paintings, drawings, lithographs, and also murals! He also lived in New York (where Victor is from) and Chicago (our first mural on the road.) We hope that this mural will bring more awareness to his importance as an artist within the community.
For the E, we featured Octavia Butler who was a well respected local sci-fi writer. She was a multiple recipient of the Hugo and Nebula awards and became the first science-fiction writer to receive a MacArthur Fellowship in 1995. Like Charles White, we admittedly only learned about them after suggestions from the community. We’ll have to hit the Altadena Library to add some of her books to our reading list! Both White and Butler are also buried locally at the Mountain View Cemetery.
In the distant background of the E, we included the Star of Palawoo which was originally built in the late 20’s by a local resident F. B. Nightingale. He erected the star, originally made of wood above his home in the foothills. “Palawoo” was the name of his estate which translated to the Indigenous word for “Birds Nest.” The star was meant to line up with Christmas Tree Lane, but due to the growth of the trees, you can’t really see it from there anymore. The star was recently rebuilt in metal and lit up again with LED bulbs by volunteers in 2019.
Altadena’s Endless Hiking Trails
Today, the majority of our peers come out to the foothill neighborhoods of Altadena for all of the hiking trails. There’s estimated to be over 45+ scenic trails within Altadena. Some of the more popular trails include Eaton Canyon and Millard Canyon Falls which both end at waterfalls. In the N, we painted a hiker on the Sam Merrill Trail that goes up to the top of Echo Mountain. In the distance, we incorporated a glimpse of the DTLA skyline. Someone had emailed us last minute asking if we were going to incorporate the history of the Altadena poppy fields. We didn’t plan for this, but decided to incorporate a few native orange poppies on the trail! We love these kinds of last minute additions.
Mount Lowe Railway
Of course we had to pay tribute to the history of Altadena and feature the Mt Lowe Railway’s circular bridge in the last A. This used to be a highlight of a passenger’s ride as well as an ingenious feat of engineering. It was a railway bridge that made nearly a full circle while climbing a steady 4.5 percent grade. At some points you would be floating above open air while making a a tight turn! While we painted the wooden trestles a natural color, we do understand that it used to be painted white. For the sake of the composition, we had to make it a warmer color. We hope that the history buffs forgive us!
The Local Wildlife
Finally, one of our favorite things about the foothill community is the variety of wildlife that can be found in the area. Altadena is home to peacocks, coyotes, bobcats, deer, mountain lions, bears and more. One of the top votes was to include a bear so we had to add a big healthy black bear next to the mural! We named him “Rubio” and hopefully it will make people do a double take when driving by on Lake.
Painting the Altadena Mural
René continued to contribute to this project by power washing the wall and doing all the necessary repairs before we started painting. He also taught Victor to stucco patch in the process which took about 3 days to complete. You can call it overkill but we now know the mural will stay intact for a long time! Local sign painters including Honeygirl Signs, Hand Painted by Ray and Alec Pelsone volunteered to help fill in the background during the first few days of painting. For the portraits, we had some help from Swank SH, a local graffiti artist who’s amazing with spray paint details. He actually created the stencil caps that Victor first used to get fine details with spray. We learned a lot of tips and tricks from just working with him for two days. We look forward to working with him more for future projects in the LA area. Lastly, a local resident & artist, Ivee Wong heard about the project and offered her assistance with the final touch ups. We were extremely grateful and happy to involve the community as much as possible.
The Greetings from Altadena mural currently holds the record for the longest production time! It took us over 20 days to complete this mural which is more than double our average time. It was our first mural as new parents and quite the learning experience for both of us. We brought the RV to the mural thinking that Lisa could be with Felix in there and bring him out to document. However, it ended up being too hot and we didn’t want to constantly run the AC. Luckily, we live close by but it’s something we’ll have to figure out when we continue to go back on the road for projects. We’re open to any advice from other artist parents who travel and paint murals!
René continued to contribute to this project by power washing the wall and doing all the necessary repairs before we started painting. He also taught Victor to stucco patch in the process which took about 3 days to complete. Local sign painters including Leanna Viers, Ray Abary and Alec Pelsone volunteered to help with the background during the first few days of painting. For the portraits, we had some help from Swank SH, a local graffiti artist who’s amazing with spray paint details. He actually created the stencil caps that Victor first used to get fine details with spray. We learned a lot of tips and tricks from just working with him for two days. We look forward to working with him more for future projects in the LA area. Lastly, a local artist, Ivee Wong heard about the project and offered her assistance with the final touch ups. We were extremely grateful and happy to involve the community as much as possible.
The west facing wall was brutal to paint in the sun. Especially since we painted such fine details it was hard to see in the afternoons. A lot of the hotter days above 90 degrees meant working only half days at the wall. Because this was a mural in our own community that we would see often, we had to go the extra mile to make it extra crispy. The hardest part of this was knowing when to call it quits. Once we reached that point, we coated the wall with a UV clear coat and then added an additional layer of anti-graffiti coating.
Placemaking With Public Art
We met tons of locals and had hours of conversations with everyone throughout the mural painting process. A lot of people said something along the lines of “I never even noticed this wall.” It’s a perfect example of how we can activate existing, neglected public spaces to create something wonderful for the neighborhood. We love that this Grocery Outlet location is very community oriented. They have hosted many past events in their lot such as Food Truck Fridays and various celebrations. Thank you to the owners Sandra & Jose for becoming so welcoming to us all.
Many friends and family stopped by during the mural painting. Usually, we’re doing projects in different cities so it was refreshing to see so many familiar faces this time. Victor’s parents also moved to the Pasadena area so they were able to watch him paint for the very first time. A shout out to them for giving us some extra behind the scenes help in this whole process as well.
For those who aren’t aware, we have a wall of fame for anyone who takes photos in front of 10+ Greetings Tour murals. We reward them with various prizes when they’ve done their fair share of traveling to find our murals. In the bigger picture, the goal is to help create tourism traffic that helps local businesses. Our only request for our followers is to support a business near any of our murals because that helps support our project in the long run. In the Altadena area, we have 3 murals here already so it will be a bigger incentive to quickly add to their collection.
Once we started the mural, we had people coming from all over who have never been to Altadena before. One family @jirosadventures, drove all the way from Vegas! Their son Jiro has been following our murals since he was 2 (when we first started this project) and he’s now 8 years old. The Pittsley Family came all the way from Washington state. They took a side trip to Altadena while they were on their family vacation to Disneyland. It was a pleasure to meet some of those on our wall of fame like Deejay Santiago who has been to 23 of our murals. The current holder of the top spot is the Dickey Family (Matt & Jocelyn with their pups Eddie & Shep) at 27 murals and they came to visit us a few times as well. It’s been really humbling to hear about people’s adventures and our murals being a part of their travels.
Mural Dedication Event
In collaboration with Grocery Outlet’s 1 year anniversary, we had a mural ribbon cutting on July 22, 2022 officiated by the Altadena Chamber. Thank you to all the different community groups who came out to the event to support. It was a day to celebrate everyone involved in making this project happen. Thank you to Deb Squared for taking historic group shot at the event! We were extremely humbled and honored by the turn out.
Credit: Deb Squared Photo
We fundraised for our annual community mural grant by selling discounted postcards & prints during this event. If you missed it, you can still purchase the items at these local retailers in Altadena:
Carciofi Design - 865 E Mariposa St, Altadena, CA 91001
Hoopla! - 2591 N Fair Oaks Ave, Altadena, CA 91001
Webster’s Pharmacy - 2450 Lake Ave, Altadena, CA 91001
*For those still looking for the T-shirts, there are limited quantities still available at Grocery Outlet.
“Watching that old blank wall transform into such a vibrant and colorful tapestry of our beautiful community’s history and highlights has been a true delight.”
ALTADENA FINE ART PRINT
SOLD OUT ONLINE!
Limited edition (of 100) 12” x 16” signed & numbered giclée fine art print ($100) still available at these local retail shops:
ALTADENA LIMITED
T-SHIRTS
SOLD OUT ONLINE!
Limited quantities still available locally at Altadena Grocery Outlet. Please ask a cashier or manager.
Retail Price: $25
Letter Guide:
A — Lake Ave. & San Gabriel Mountains
L — Eliot Arts Magnet Academy
T — Christmas Tree Lane
A — Christmas Tree Lane (continued)
D — Charles White
E — Octavia Butler & The Star of Palawoo
N — Hiker on Sam Merrill Trail
A — Mount Lowe Railway Circular Bridge
Local Recommendations:
Coffee: Cafe De Leche, Highlight Coffee, Unincorporated Coffee Roasters
Food: Amara Kitchen, Bulgarini Gelato, Homestate, Perry’s Joint, Sidepie
Day Hikes: Millard Canyon Falls Trail, Eaton Canyon Falls Trail, Cobb Estate
Shopping: Carciofi Design, Hoopla!, Webster's Pharmacy
Parks: Farnsworth Park, Lomo Alto Park (Farmer’s Market)
Misc: Bunny Museum, Zorthian Ranch (need to book a tour)
Press:
Colorado Boulevard - New Postcard Mural on Lake in Altadena Is Taking Shape
Year: 2022
Mural Size: 14'H x 31'W
Location: 2270 Lake Ave. Altadena, CA 91001