Skype a Scientist is partnering with the East Kensington Neighbors Association and H.A. Brown school to install a mural on the theme of East Kensington's Biodiversity in Spring of 2026!

Connecting people to the wildlife they live alongside, especially in urban environments, is a major goal of our organization. In any neighborhood in our city, one can find bats, moths, hawks, and more, and our 2 rivers are home to everything from endangered Atlantic sturgeon to beavers. Despite this diversity, it’s easy to miss all of these creatures if you’re not looking for them, as many are active at night, or live in hard-to-access riverbanks, blocked by development and industrialization. If there’s one way Philly loves to communicate, it’s with public art. We have more murals than any other city in North America. We will be connecting people with their hometown wildlife in a project designed by Philadelphians for Philadelphians.

This project will be completed in 3 phases:

Neighbor Feedback and Voting ✅
Painting
Celebration and Activation

Phase 1: Neighbor Feedback and voting ✅

Neighbors will be given the opportunity to drive this project from the start. In a community meeting, Skype a Scientist will present a list of artists that have applied to work on this project via an open call. Neighbors will vote on which artist they’d like to invite. At this meeting, neighbors will also be presented with a menu of ecological topics that the mural could cover, including but not necessarily limited to:

- Native Plants & Pollinators
- Urban Mammals (e.g. raccoons, possums, etc)
- Nocturnal wildlife (bats, moths)
- Pennsylvania insects

Upon making this decision, we will hire the chosen artist and meet to discuss necessary points we’d like the mural to communicate to those who view it.

Update: The neighbors voted on the week of February 16th! They chose Native Plants & Pollinators and artist Nick D'Auria! We are now working with the elementary school students and having them vote on their favorite bug to include in the design.

Phase 2: Painting

The artist and our executive director will power wash, prime, and prep the wall. We will then outline the mural’s design resulting in a “paint by numbers” wall, so that participants of all skill levels can feel empowered to participate. We have used the paint by numbers model in previous community murals with great success (see photo below). The community paint day will be widely promoted to the neighborhood to encourage attendance. On our community paint day, in addition to painting, we will have other educational activities, including activity kits that residents can take home. After community paint day, our executive director and the artist will put finishing touches on the mural and coat it with a resin that protects the work from graffiti.

Phase 3: Celebration and activation

Once complete, we will host a mural unveiling, where we will distribute educational material, have educational activities, and of course celebrate what we’ve created together. We want to encourage residents to take the next step into action in protecting our local ecosystem, and will give them the opportunity to start acting at this event.

H.A. Brown Elementary School Mural