In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Curbside Commons Design for Distancing project converted a parking lane into public space for safe, physically distanced community gathering, shopping, services, and culinary encounters along Hamilton-Lauraville’s main street, Harford Road. Led by Graham Projects, the design-build team included Property Consulting, Inc., LANNINGSMITH, and Annie Howe Paper Cuts. The team collaborated with the Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street and adjacent small businesses to create public spaces that meet their needs to stay open while maintaining COVID-19 precautions, including outdoor seating, distancing markers, event space, pedestrian and wheelchair accessibility, public art, signage, bicycle parking, and artful wayfinding.

Design for Distancing Curbside Commons
StreetBond 150 pavement coating, thermoplastic crosswalks and bump outs, flex-posts, water-filled barriers, shade sails, outdoor seating, umbrellas, custom benches, bike racks
15,400sf, dimensions vary
June - November 2020
4300, 4700, & 4800 blocks of Harford Rd, Baltimore, MD 21214
Project partners: Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street, Baltimore Development Corporation, Neighborhood Design Center, Baltimore City DOT, Equus Striping

Public artist Graham Coreil-Allen collaborates with neighbors to improve public space through placemaking projects for pedestrian safety and play. Designed with communtiy input and created with volunteer assistance, these iconic, bright crosswalk artworks enhance safety by creating more protected pedestrian space and drawing the attention of passing motorists to the pedestrians’ safety needs and right-of-way.

Reverberations Crosswalks
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/reverberations-crosswalk-calvert/
Friends of Margaret Brent Elementary/Middle School
26th St. & St Paul St. + 26th St. & Calvert St., Baltimore, MD
June - September 2019

The Reverberations Crosswalks are pavement murals that enhance pedestrian safety for children and residents walking to and from Margaret Brent Elementary/Middle School while celebrating the school’s art education focus. Located in central Baltimore along 26th Street and St. Paul Street, and 26th Street and Calvert Street, the artistic crosswalk features large scale icons in white representing the arts, love, and beauty, surrounded by reverberating outlines on top of a base layer of angled shapes in eye-catching colors, including turquoise, orange, lime green, and salmon red. The symbols and colors that make up the design are inspired by drawings created by students during a workshop held the school in June 2018 and installed with the help of local volunteers. The icons include a crayon, music note, book, paint brush, microphone, heart, and flower.

Collington Square Oak Wisdom Crosswalks & Street Pole Banners
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/collington-square/
Collington Square Neighborhood Association, City Life Community Builders, and the Baltimore City Department of Transportation
N Chester St & E Chase St, Baltimore, MD 21213
November 2020

The Collington Square community of East Baltimore holds a 200+ year old Swamp White Oak tree as its symbol. The “Oak Wisdom” traffic calming art crosswalks and Collington Square Neighborhood Association street pole banners are inspired by looking up through those sanctuary leaves. For decades the adjacent active, elevated train tracks have served as a visual and psychological barrier between Collington Square and its neighbors closer to Johns Hopkins Hospital. The street pole banners elevate neighborhood identity by showcasing a positive symbol for the area - the beloved centuries-old tree that stands magnificently atop the hill in their local park. The art crosswalks and “bump outs” provide a welcome gateway to Collington Square while slowing down aggressive car traffic, improving street-crossing safety for its residents who rely on walking to get to school and work.

Barclay STEM Crosswalks
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/barclay-stem-crosswalks/
Friends of Barclay Elementary/Middle School
29th St. & Barclay St., Baltimore, MD
October 2019

STEM Bubbles is a traffic calming pavement mural of angular shapes in eye-catching, Barclay Elementary / Middle School colors, bright blue and orange, connected by white bubbles marking pedestrian paths. Located at 29th and Barclay Streets in central Baltimore, the placemaking artwork is accented with a set of white icons at the northwest corner representing the school’s focus: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. The icons include a beaker for science, tablet with code for technology, a wrench for engineering, and arithmetic symbols for math. The symbols and colors that make up the design are inspired by drawings created by students during a workshop held at the school in June 2018 and installed with the help of local volunteers.

Showcasing the cherished connections between Druid Hill Park and surrounding neighborhoods, the Arches & Access project illuminated and activated the historic Druid Hill Park Gate at Madison Avenue, Druid Hill Park, and the Rawlings Conservatory with colorful lights, a community parade, and a public party. On the evening of November 3rd, 2019, over three hundred residents, artists, and performers transformed Madison Avenue at Druid Park Lake Drive into a spectacular, roving block party. Neighbors collectively created a place to march, dance, and perform in celebration of our West Baltimore communities united in green space and creating safe streets for people.

Arches & Access was a Neighborhood Lights Project presented as part of the Brilliant Baltimore / Light City festival of light and literature. The event was led by Reservoir Hill artist Jessy DeSantis, Reservoir Hill advocate Courtney Bettle, and Auchentoroly Terrace public artist Graham Coreil-Allen with major support from the Reservoir Hill Improvement Council, a grant from Baltimore Heritage, and volunteers from Beth Am Synagogue’s IFO organization. The Reservoir Hill mothers Bettle and DeSantis took inspiration from DeSantis’ colorful painting of the Arches when they came up with the idea of creating a light art project in early 2019. Later the two reached out to Coreil-Allen of Graham Projects to help realize the light art. Collectively they expanded the vision to include solar powered lights leading into the park, activated by a joyful community parade showing what life could be like without highways hindering pedestrian access to Druid Hill Park.

Arches & Access Light Art and Community Parade
https://tapdruidhill.org/2019/11/20/arches-and-access/
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/arches-access 
Multicolor LED spotlights, parade, block party
Druid Hill Park Gate, Druid Hill Park, Rawlings Conservatory
November 3, 2019
Reservoir Hill Improvement Council, TAP Druid Hill, Rawling Conservatory, Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, Beth Am IFO

Premiering at the 2018 Light City Baltimore festival, Sun Stomp was a solar powered light and interactive audio-visual environment that for eight nights activated McKeldin Square. The monumental scaffolding sculpture featured an interactive projection on one side and an array of sixteen 290 watt solar panels on the other. Electrical energy collected during the day and was stored as chemical energy in a battery bank which provided electricity to a colorful array of LED neon lights illuminating the structure after dark. Participants were invited to stomp on the bleacher footboards to trigger sun-inspired visuals and amplified sounds of the Sun sourced from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory. Passersby were also invited to peer into the custom built “Power Shed” to learn about the solar technology and AV controls energizing the project. Foot-stomping powers combined, participants visually and experientially conjured the awesome and beautiful power of the sun.

Solar and Storage Statistics

• Sun Stomp featured 527 feet of LED lighting.
• All 16 solar panels provided 4,640 Watts per sun hour or 23,200 Watts per day in April.
• The average home in Baltimore uses 7,546 kilowatts per year; the same amount of electricity produced by these 16 solar panels and stored by the battery bank.
• The 16 solar panels installed on a home would save $1,052 annually in electricity charges.During Light City the Sun Stomp solar panels will prevented 200 pounds of CO2 emissions from local electricity generation.

About the Sun Stomp Collective
The Baltimore-based Sun Stomp Collective brings expertise in solar energy, interactive media, and participatory environments. Matthew Weaver has over a decade of experience in renewable energy engineering, including hydrogen and solar; and grassroots organizing around social justice and sustainability. Mark Brown is a video artist, DJ, curator, and AV expert at the Peabody Conservatory. His video work embraces the Internet as both gallery and medium, creating new works from the cracks, glitches, and fall-out of digital realities. Graham Coreil-Allen is a public artist and organizer making cities more inclusive and livable through public art, radical walking tours, and civic engagement.

Sun Stomp
http://grahamprojects.com/projects/sunstomp
April 14-21, 2018
Light City Baltimore, McKeldin Square, 101 E. Pratt Street, Baltimore, MD
Scaffolding, bleachers, solar panels, solar hardware, projection screen, projector, LED neon, contact microphones, video processor
34’x24’x75’
Project partner: Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts

Anchoring the 2017 Artscape Charles Street Trail July 21-23, Dancing Forest was a kinetic environment of inflatable trees emblazoned with trail markers identifying Baltimore’s many classic places, features, and customs. Participants were encouraged to walk among and explore the the animated trees as they undulated in the sky. Up close, one found an array of urban trail symbols, such as benches, snowballs, bikers, and buildings. Internal LED illumination of the sculptures allowed nighttime exploration. Combining spectacular movement with urban wayfinding symbols, Dancing Forest created an exciting, playful environment inspiring participants to continue exploring Baltimore’s many intriguing places.

Dancing Forest
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/dancingforest/
July 21-23, 2017
Artscape
Charles Street Bridge, Baltimore, MD
Submersion printed nylon, blowers, felt, LED lights, grass, website
20’ x 45’ x 200’
Project partners: Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, Station North Tool Library

Choose your own Adventure transformed Baltimore’s Charles Street Bridge into a colorful playscape of pedestrian pathways and hanging beach balls. The project was commissioned by Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts for the free 2018 Artscape festival. Spray chalk lines marked a site-based map converging under a forest of beach balls hanging from an open air structure. The streetscape-enhancing project was a collaboration between Baltimore-based public artists Becky Borlan and Graham Coreil-Allen.

Choose your own Adventure took inspiration from the natural paths taken by street-crossing pedestrians, the Jones Falls and train tracks below, and the joyful experiences of summer-inspired toys. Hundreds of thousands of festival goers interacted with the kinetic environment of over four hundred colorful, translucent beach balls and a line striping street mural covering over three thousand square feet. Numerous beach balls featured hand-painted instructions offering choices for adventures beyond. Adventures included “Write a Poem in the Dirt”, “Change your name for the summer,” and “Take the first train to the end of the line.” Through tactical urbanism and creative design, the installation previewed possibilities for completely transforming the Charles Street Bridge into a playful, poetic, and pedestrian environment.

Beach ball text hand-painted by Greg Gannon of Signs of Intelligent Life. 

Choose Your Own Adventure
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/adventure-artscape/
July 20-22, 2018

Charles Street Bridge at Penn Station, Artscape, Baltimore, MD
Beach balls, line striping paint, tent structure, LED lights, poetry
12’x40’x100’
Project partner: Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts

Produced seperately with the City of El Paso and the Baltimore Museum of Art, Crafting the Corridor, Visioning Home Mapping, and FutureSite Baltimore were interactive mapping installations and activities in which residents wrote on and placed laser cut cardboard signs within immersive maps to illustrate and discuss their neighborhood assets, challenges, and new ideas.

Crafting the Corridor
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/crafting-the-corridor/

October 6, 2018
El Paso Museum of Art, El Paso, TX
Color vinyl banner, laser cut pop-up signs, play doh, tape, markers
10’x20’
Project partners: Planning & Inspections Department of the City of El Paso, Offices of El Paso City Council Representatives Peter Svarzbein and Cissy Lizarraga

Through the Crafting the Corridor community tour and interactive mapping workshop, El Paso residents, business owners, planners, and elected officials shared personal perspectives and identified local assets, challenges, and ideas for strengthening their neighborhoods along the city’s new streetcar routes. Locals participated in an interactive hop-on/hop-off bus tour that took them along the North and South streetcar loops. At each stop speakers shared points of interest and perspectives on current issues, local history, and opportunities for preservation and growth. Participants returned to the El Paso Museum of Art for a facilitated discussion and creative mapping session led by public artist Graham Coreil-Allen and El Paso 1st District council representative and artist Peter Svarzbein. Residents used laser cut cardboard signs, colorful tape, and play doh to write, illustrate, and sculpt their neighborhood assets, challenges, and new ideas for building on the city’s streetcar revival. They placed their handmade signs and sculptures on corresponding locations within an immersive, colorful 10’ x 20’ vinyl floor map. El Paso city planners documented participants’ numerous contributions as input for the El Paso Streetcar Corridor Plan.

BMA Visioning Home Mapping Workshop
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/bma-visioning-home-mapping/
September 23, 2017
Baltimore Museum of Art
10 Art Museum Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218
gaff tape, laser cut cardboard, spray paint, play doh, markers
24' x 24' x 12”
Project partner: Baltimore Museum of Art

Visioning Home was a day-long workshop at the Baltimore Museum of Art that invited participants to challenge the entrenched narratives about Baltimore neighborhoods and envision possible futures. As part of the Imagining Home exhibit series, forty residents from across the city gathered for this meaningful day to learn about civically engaged art, find inspiration in the museum’s collection, and take part in a series of facilitated conversations and artmaking activities designed to spark creative thinking about changes and opportunities in Baltimore. El Paso artist and city councilperson Peter Svarzbein presented on how his fictitious advertising campaign to revive a defunct trolley raised $97 million in funding to re-establish strong cultural and economic bonds between El Paso, Texas and Juarez, Mexico communities. Group discussions were captured throughout the day by visualizations drawn onto the studio's walls by graphic recorder Lucinda Levine. The day of engagement culminated in an interactive mapping installation and activity created and led by public artist Graham Coreil-Allen. Participants used laser cut cardboard signs to write and illustrate their neighborhood assets, challenges, and new ideas. They placed these signs on corresponding locations within an immersive, 22’ x 24’ floor map made of brightly colored tape. Residents highlighted and sensitively discussed a range of issues such as the school-to-prison pipeline, food deserts, and industrial pollution; and proposed new ideas such as job-creating urban farms, universal tuition, and completing Baltimore’s mass transit rail network.

FutureSite Mapping Baltimore
http://grahamprojects.com/projects/futuresite-baltimore/
The Necessity of Tomorrow(s): Mark Bradford—Making a Path
Saturday, November 11, 2017, 12pm-3:30pm
Presented by the Baltimore Museum of Art at Union Baptist Church, Baltimore, MD
Partners: The Baltimore Museum of Art, Union Baptist Church

How do you make a path to power where none exists? How do you assess a community's needs and create access for a community to self-determine?

Presented by the Baltimore Museum of Art at Union Baptist Church, FutureSite Baltimore invited participants to challenge the entrenched narratives about our city and envision possible futures by sharing their neighborhood assets, concerns, and ideas. This interactive mapping activity was presented as part of the The Necessity of Tomorrow(s) lecture series featuring luminary artist Mark Bradford in conversation with BMA Director Christopher Bedford. Bradford’s talk explored how the artist grapples with “making a path,” and other key questions in his artistic practice and community-based work. Afterwards, attendees were invited to contribute to the FutureSite Baltimore map by writing on laser cut signs and creating play doh sculptures representing their inspired visions for the future of Baltimore City. Contributions to the map were collected by the museum to inform forthcoming programming.

The Big Jump is a temporary path accessible by foot, bike, and mobility devices along Druid Park Lake Drive and 28th Street in Baltimore, Maryland. This demonstration project counteracts decades of highway expansion that effectively cut off the surrounding working class African American neighborhoods from the park. As a local resident and public artist, Graham Coreil-Allen collaborated with Bikemore, Baltimore City Department of Transportation, and neighbors on creating signage and stencils along the Big Jump pathway that make it safer for all people to enjoy the cultural and public health benefits of Druid Hill Park.

The Big Jump logo was designed by Danielle Parnes on behalf of Bikemore, with icon input from Coreil-Allen. Coreil-Allen then adapted the logo to serve as pathway signage and wayfinding. The signage features icons representing different active uses, including walking, wheelchair riding, bicycling dog walking, and skateboarding. The vinyl cut signs show motorists and passersby the uses of the Big Jump pathway. To provide wayfinding for people not in cars we also made and sprayed large scale street stencils highlighting pathway primary uses - walking, wheelchair riding, and bicycling. In addition, we stenciled colorful footprint trails that visually lead residents from surrounding blocks to safe access points for the Big Jump Baltimore pathway and Druid Hill Park.

Big Jump Baltimore Wayfinding
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/big-jump-wayfinding/

August 2018
Druid Park Lake Drive and 28th Street, Baltimore, MD
Aerosol traffic paint, cut vinyl
Dimensions vary
Project partners: Bikemore, Baltimore City DOT

The Monumental City is played by giants among many – the business person, the bird, the worker and you. Hopscotch Crosswalk Colossus is an intersection of four oversized hopscotch-court-crosswalks, each featuring a quintessential Baltimore path-print. Featuring the shoe, the bird track, the boot and the footprint, the project is a monument to the people who populate the Bromo Tower Arts & Entertainment District and make Baltimore The Greatest City in America.

North Side: The Shoe
The Towering Businessperson skips east approaching downtown skyscrapers.
East Side: The Bird Track
The Superbird Champion hops south heading to Camden Yards and The Raven’s Walk.
South Side: The Boot
Wobbling west The Worker passes through a former garment district built by labor.
West Side: The Footprint
The Hippie Artist bounces north with abandon towards lofty digs in the Bromo Tower Arts & Entertainment District.

Hopscotch Crosswalk Colossus
https://grahamprojects.com/projects/hopscotch-crosswalk-colossus/
December 4, 2013
Eutaw and Lombard Streets
Baltimore, MD

Permanent crosswalks installation

Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts

New Public Sites walking tours explore the history, design and uses of overlooked public spaces. From championing pedestrian accessibility around Druid Hill Park, to exploring the robust and emerging civic spaces and public art of Arlington County, New Public Sites tours show that place is truly what we made of it. Through New Public Sites walking tours we poetically re-experienced everyday public spaces while learning from community leaders and civil servants how to affect change at the block level. Recent tours include the Auchentoroly by Foot, Rosslyn Public Art, Mondawmin Crossings, Druid Hill Reservoir Interchange, Bromo District, and Five Points Denver.

New Public Sites consist of everyday public spaces existing in one or more of three states: rendered mute by their physical and discursive emptiness, ambiguous due to contextual contradictions of urban design, and/or invisible from a lack of formal architectural framing and practical readability. Through tours, maps and videos, Public Artist Graham Coreil-Allen cultivates pedestrian agency, interprets aspects of the everyday and investigates the negotiable nature of the built environment. New Public Sites invites you to practice “radical pedestrianism” – traveling by foot through infinite sites of freedom while testing the limits of and redefining public space.

New Public Sites Walking Tours
https://newpublicsites.org/
2009 - present
Various sites