Art Walk Partners

Creating the Art Walk offered a unique opportunity for community-university engagement.  Here we would like to introduce the members of our team.


Cherry Street Community Garden Club

Cherry Street Community Garden was established in 2012 in the Midtown neighborhood, and features thirty-three 4 foot by 16 foot raised beds, a twenty-tree fruit orchard and two little free libraries.  The Garden Club meets weekly during the garden season to build community and learn new skills.  The garden is built on property owned by the Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee (HACM). 


Logo for BloomMKE

BloomMKE, Inc.

BloomMKE’s mission is to promote community enrichment for residents of low-income housing and public housing in Milwaukee using community gardens as resources for engagement, education, and relationship building.

As part of this project, BloomMKE provided project management, carpentry, and linkage between the community members and university students to facilitate a constructive and engaging environment for all.

Click here to learn more about BloomMKE, Inc.


Milwaukee School of Art & Design

During the Spring 2023 semester, a total of twelve MIAD students were engaged in eight art projects for Cherry Street Community Garden.  

Mural Project: As part of Professor Brad Bernard’s Spring 2023 muraling class, a large 8 foot by 10 foot mural was designed and painted for Cherry Street Community Garden.

Service Learning Projects:  Every year, MIAD students actively engage in community service throughout the Milwaukee area.  In the Spring 2023 semester, MIAD students designed new welcome signs, murals, and carvings for the totems of the Shade Oasis for Cherry Street Community Garden.​

Listen to Professor Hj/Helen Bullard explain the Service Learning course at MIAD.

Click here to learn more about MIAD.


University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee

​UWM School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Spring 2023 Mass Timber class: Led by Professor Alex Timmer, the Spring 2023 Mass Timber class designed functional and aesthetically pleasing benches for Cherry Street Community Garden.  During their CNC workshop, they also carved the structural totems for the Shade Oasis.

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Buildings-Landscapes-Cultures (BLC) Field School: Led by Professor Arijit Sen, students in the BLC explore urban neighborhoods to discover their complexity.  The field school began working with Cherry Street Community Garden in the summer of 2022 and assisted the Art Walk by conducting artist interviews. They will continue exploring the Midtown neighborhood and collecting oral histories throughout 2023 and 2024.

​​Click here to learn more about UWM’s School or Architecture & Urban Planning, and here to learn more about the BLC.


The Kellogg PEAK Initiative

At PEAK, leadership is defined as understanding, developing and using your power to positively influence people and/or places. We all have ways that we can have a positive impact on our world, big and small, formal and informal. Young people need opportunities to explore their innate capacity for leadership at an early age.

​Youth ambassadors from the Leaders in Training (LT) program led community visioning sessions and history harvests to learn more about their community and provide design input for this project. They also helped paint the flower garden mural at Cherry Street Community Garden.

​​Click here to learn more about The Kellogg PEAK Initiative.


Joy Engine Foundation

The Art Walk was made possible thanks to a Community Challenge grant from Joy Engine.

​​Click here to learn more about Joy Engine.