Penn Ave Come to Life - Unblurred August

In my opinion, I couldn't live in a better area of Pittsburgh. When I was figuring out what neighborhood I would call home upon my return, I thought about Lawrenceville, Friendship, Regent Square, Squirrel Hill (only for a fleeting moment), and Bloomfield. Ultimately, I decided on a place in Bloomfield, and I couldn't be happier. I am five minutes from the beautiful mansions of Friendship. I am five minutes from yummy food on Liberty Ave. And I am five minutes from Penn Ave, a street that comes to life the first Friday of every month for Unblurred.

This past Friday was the first Friday of August. I'd missed the past couple Unblurreds for various reasons, so I was excited to have a free night for a stroll down Penn, ducking into galleries, enjoying free beer, and taking in some interesting sights.

I met my friend Dan at my place, and we decided to walk down Coral and avoid much of Penn until we got to The Cotton Factory, where awesome t-shirts, free East End Brewery beers, and Franktuary hot dogs were promised.

We each picked up $5 t-shirts. I wanted all of the t-shirts. Seriously. All of them. Especially the ferris wheel, powerlines, dinos, and ghosts ones. Oh, when will I be wildly wealthy?

Fun fact: On this day, I had Franktuary for lunch AND dinner. And it was great.

As we walked down Penn, I stopped often to take pictures of things. This might be my new favorite street art. But, I think that all the time. There's just so much to see and fall in love with on these streets.

During our Unblurred excursion, I was most interested in stopping into Assemble, a new space on Penn that I am very excited about. Their show, With What They Left, was great. It looked like someone ransacked a bunch of abandoned houses and recycled their finds as great installations and creations. I especially loved the back room, which you entered and felt like you were inside of somewhere about to crumble to bits. Wallpaper was stripped and handing from the walls and ceiling. The floor was littered with pages of a book, ripped out and strewn all over.

We also stopped into the new Mr. Roboto Project, which is now right up the street from me. It looks like they still have plenty of work left to go, but it's great to see the new location coming together.

We also ventured into Most Wanted Fine Art, and the picture above comes from there. We also popped into Garfield Artworks and Modern Formations. Once we were all cultured out, Dan and I strolled back toward my place, where we ended up joining some friends for a beer on a balcony. From there, I headed to Silky's on Liberty for a mini high school reunion.

That's the thing I love about being back in Pittsburgh. My night can be full of loud, interesting art, then go to a quiet gathering three stories above a main street, and then end sitting outside of a neighborhood bar, drinking beers and laughing about things past and present. A great end to a semi-stressful week.