When developers built a row of five new homes on the 1900 block of Alter Street a few years ago, they were none too pleased with the aesthetic across the street, where the back of a Washington Avenue warehouse presented views of a mostly blank brick wall. So they decided to paint a mural on the wall, creating the image of five row homes, in an effort to make the half industrial block feel a little more welcoming. We should probably mention that OCF Realty, our parent company and the listing agents for the project, were involved as well.
But change is inexorable, and it was a sure thing that this mural, which we loved when it first appeared, would eventually see some alterations. If you visit this block today, you'll not only see that a couple additional (real) homes have appeared, like the new home at 1922 Alter St. in the photo above, but that the mural has undergone a few changes. YD Hardwood, located on the side of the wall, has poked some holes in the mural and has filled in some others. Take a look:
In this image, we see that the business has installed a new door, unfortunately not in the same location as the door painted in the mural. They've also cut what looks like a new window opening on the "2nd floor," but there's no window there as of yet. Additionally, the "cornice" looks like it was somehow removed or painted over, though this might just be fading paint over time.
The easternmost section of the mural originally included two homes that were painted to correspond with two real doors, used as back entrances to the building on Washington Avenue. The red home retains its original appearance and if you look closely you can see there's a fake plant in the fake window. For the green house next door, you can see the door has been bricked over, and a new window has appeared in its place. On the plus side, the cornice still looks great.
Hey, we get it, when you have a mural on the backside of an active business there's no guarantee it will be maintained as originally conceived. Still, it's a bit of a bummer that this mural has been changed so dramatically in such a short period of time. We wonder, once YD Hardwood is done making new doors and windows in the back, whether they might consider making an effort to rework this mural to jive more comfortably with the changes they've made.