Smart towns and cities encourage beautifying of downtown walls and windows by local creatives. Walls become canvases awaiting a brush, an artist and surprising iterations. They are a delight to the eyes, covering up weather-worn, ignored and dull surfaces.

Canvas on Gore Street, Perth, depicts quilting tradition.

In Perth, a plain brick wall on the ‘main drag’ is covered-over with a touching painting commemorating early settlers, women quilting for a bride-to-be.

Amazing graffiti at Doug Fluhrer Park, Kingston, just East of Downtown on water’s edge. This 3-D graffiti is thinking out of the one dimensional box.

Legal practice in Smith Falls features stunning, realistic faux wall.

In Smith Falls, a legal firm delights the eye with a trompe l’oeil: a man on scaffolding renovating faux bricks, windows and walls. A front door also fools the eye with a faux view of the door ajar and interiors. It is humorous and delightful. It is The Wedge’s top pick for this excursion–a must see.

Carleton Place’s extraordinary Trompe l’oeil wall art , “Last Train to Carleton Place”

Carleton Place’s historic air battle large painting is visible to everyone exiting downtown.

Carleton Place enjoys at least two exceptional walls. One wall is a trompe l’oeil; a locomotive seems to be crossing under an overpass, bursting through the wall. It is merely the Rideau Cleaners’ building.

An other wall in the North end displays a beautiful work featuring an historic air battle.

Almonte features a few canvases in a downtown covered walkway.

Almonte had a few canvases on walkway walls and the post office. These two panels depict historic personages. The town centre is not lacking in beauty, buttressed by rapids at one end and a dramatic hill at the other.

Streetscapes, as they are otherwise named, are a good solution and under-utilized in downtown sectors; they cover-up stores that have closed or spaces that are barren. “They just gussy-up the place,” we Wedgees witness today.