This kid-friendly, interactive public art experience in the South Street Headhouse District was a collaboration with fiber artist Greta Shanley, who goes by WEFOMB (With Every Fiber Of My Being). It consisted of four knitted and crocheted yarn installations that asked you what makes your heart feel a certain way. At each installation, you could find paper handouts to record your response (for use in a future art project). To further delight you, we also created site-specific scavenger hunts and puzzles on each handout—because kids and adults alike should be in touch with their emotions! You could win your own crocheted heart by returning one or more completed handouts to a participating business, The Philly Game Shop. At some locations, you could also use sidewalk chalk to add your own feelings and art to our installations.
This event grew out of a feeling that Greta and I both experienced: the impulse to create something that would safely bring people together for moments of joy after months of isolation. In mid-2020, on opposite sides of the Atlantic and independently of each other, we both started creating delightful, street art-focused experiences in our respective neighborhoods. (For me, that was Philly Street Art Hunt.) Eventually, our ideas converged in a place we both feel connected to: South Street. In addition to economic challenges brought on by the pandemic, the district endured several traumas in 2022, and we wanted to offer a diversion that encourages everyone to consider what truly makes them happy.
How to participate: Participation was available by finding one of WEFOMB’s four yarnbombs in the South Street Headhouse District and grabbing a handout from the box!
Prizes: Your own “Happy Heart,” handmade by Greta, to take home!
