Heart of Kensington Creates
About the Project
Heart of Kensington Creates is a cross-sector, community-centered arts initiative focused on collective impact – lifting each neighborhood to celebrate its identity while building on its shared Kensington pride. The initiative, in collaboration with Councilperson Quetcy Lozada’s Office and Impact Services, aims to create a series of murals, art installations, and activations along Kensington Avenue between the Huntingdon Street Station and the Tioga Street Station, culminating in August 2026.
The public art component of the project will include six large-scale murals, six smaller-scale murals/art installations, 3-local gallery activations, a community wide paint activity to be displayed on the Septa “El” line (the Gusset Plate Project), and the inclusion of the Affirmation Avenue series, a collection of curated positive affirmation street signs personalized by predominantly Black/African American communities throughout Philadelphia.
We are Looking for Artists Now!
Artists RFP Available NOW! Apply HERE! Application deadline: January 9, 2026
Dates to Remember
December 11 | 4:30 pm – 6:30 pm
Gusset Plate Project @Cookies and Carols
Esperanza CORE Fitness Center, 3222 H Street
December 13 | 12 pm – 3 pm
Gusset Plate Project @Winter Fest
Harrowgate Park, 3455 Kensington Avenue
December 17 | 5 pm – 6 pm
Gusset Plate Project @HOKC RFP Artist Q&A
Virtual Meeting
LINK: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88650270760
December 20 | 12 pm – 3 pm
Winter Fest
McPherson Square, 601 E Indiana Ave.
Friday, January 9 at 11:59 pm
HOKC Artist Applications Due
Link to Application
January 16, 2026
HOKC Selected Artists Notified
More about the Gusset Plate Project
Color Me Back, Mural Arts’ same-day work-and-pay program, will lead the charge on a community-wide painting project called the Gusset Plate Project. Named after the “gusset plates”, triangular-shaped support structures below the “El” train, which incorporates a modular painting method to make highly collaborative art. The plan is to have each triangle-shaped section painted by one or more Kensington community members, leaving their own unique mark along the SEPTA line from Huntingdon to Tioga, adding up to hundreds of works of community-made art.
About Impact Services
Since 1974, Impact Services has been working in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia to help people re-enter the workforce, find stable housing, and help build community. Over the last two decades they have built a continuum of housing services in an effort to end homelessness.
With an action orientation to creating connected, resilient, thriving communities Impact employs a multidimensional approach to systems change investing in both people and place over time. Impact’s work is grounded in the creation of environmental, emotional, and interpersonal safety with the consideration of significant adversity in individual, family, and community histories.
More information here: https://www.impactservices.org/.
