Wilkinsburg Weekly Part 3 – Vacant Home Art

[Photo by Callie Oliver. Image description: a large vacant urban home with art painted on boarded up windows and large trees blocking full view of the home.]
In week three of Wilkinsburg Weekly, I wanted to share these photos of some of the Wilkinsburg vacant homes. Boarded up windows are colorfully painted and make the best of what would be drab, vacant, blight. Artists added paintings to the homes that are part of the Wilkinsburg Vacant Homes Tour, which aims to inspire people to purchase one of the historical properties for renovation. Many of these buildings look rough, but they have structural integrity that would allow for renovating them to be livable, even though many are over 100 years old.

Renovations can be a hassle, but there are no doubt environmental benefits to restoring what already exists instead of destroying them without considering other options. Renovating takes “reuse” to an entirely new level, especially if you use reclaimed parts to do the project.

Renovating vacant homes in Wilkinsburg has benefits to the environment, but there’s also plenty of questions about whether there’s asbestos, lead paint or pipes, what kind of indoor environmental pollution might be there, and how to truly clean it up to best serve the local environment as a whole.

What do you think? Would you take on a renovation project of a vacant home?

[Photo by Callie Oliver. Image description: A vacant two-story home in Wilkinsburg with a balcony on the second floor. Words along the base read “the forgotten farm stand” and the boarded windows are painted with colorful nature-themed designs.]
[Photo by Callie Oliver. Image Description: a large light blue vacant home in Wilkinsburg with bare trees in front and boarded windows with paintings that resemble bees and honeycombs in bright colors.]

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