St. Charles mural to encourage social media engagement

An image of a cluster of colorful bubbles billowing from a wand soon will adorn a brick wall in downtown St. Charles.

The sticker mural, expected to be installed within the month, is an attempt by the Downtown St. Charles Partnership to attract a younger demographic to the nearby shops, restaurants and public amenities, Director Jenna Sawicki told city aldermen Monday. The image contains a hashtag and will encourage visitors to take photos and engage on social media, she said.

"It's an initiative of the Downtown St. Charles Partnership to create more public art - what we're calling wall poetry," Sawicki said. "We hope to try this as a less permanent way to have interactive art in the downtown."

The temporary mural, sized at 5 feet by 7 feet, will be located within a First Street Plaza walkway between the Pizzeria Neo and Puebla Modern Mexican restaurants. It was designed by summer intern and St. Charles native Meagan Smith, who said she also received help from a co-worker at her second internship at Chicago Coding Systems.

The St. Charles-based marketing and coding company creates removable stickers made from an aluminum-based substrate that won't damage the wall. Smith presented the concept to the downtown partnership and helped narrow down a long list of ideas for how the artwork should look, she said.

The chosen design, which went through the organization's marketing and promotions committee, allows visitors to pose as if they're blowing bubbles out of a wand, Sawicki said. It will be installed by Chicago Coding Systems and is expected to last about a year, depending on weather conditions.

"Meagan kind of combined her two worlds on this," Sawicki said. "It's very colorful and very cute for the downtown."

The temporary artwork is a more cost-effective and lower-risk option than a permanent mural, Sawicki said. She hopes it will serve as an attraction similar to Nashville's popular "What Lifts You" mural featuring a large set of wings.

If the St. Charles image is well received, she said, the organization hopes to add more sticker murals around other parts of the city.