Quick Take
The City of Santa Cruz is taking proposals for a potentially giant new downtown mural on the yet-to-be-constructed development on the corner of Soquel Avenue and Front Street. The deadline for submissions is Oct. 31.
The City of Santa Cruz is now soliciting artists’ proposals for a downtown mural — and it’s a doozy. It will be up to seven stories and 85 feet tall, on the yet-to-be-constructed mixed-use housing development at 530 Front St. The project will contain 276 housing units on the corner of Front Street and Soquel Avenue, and will make up a significant portion of the revived waterfront development along the San Lorenzo River.
The city, along with the project’s developer, Swenson Builders, and the Oakland-based public-arts consultant group Local Language, is looking for artists to submit proposals for the large-scale mural that will face Soquel Avenue near a revitalized riverwalk.
The deadline for submissions is Oct. 31. Interested artists can apply here.
In recent years, downtown Santa Cruz has become a city of murals, thanks largely to the Sea Walls project in 2021. But the scale of the new mural could make it a dominant image of the city’s downtown.
The winning design will be chosen by a committee made up of representatives from the city, the developer and Local Language. The committee will choose the design based on its theme, to “evoke a strong sense of place.” It could be a collage made up of many smaller detailed images or one enormous image (or something in between), though the application makes it clear that the committee is looking for something to serve as a kind of artistic profile of Santa Cruz.
The mural is expected to be unveiled at some point late in 2026.
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