Home is where we want to be....

Side Street Projects is actively seeking a permanent home within the communities that are served by Pasadena Unified School District. We would like to stay near our current community of NW Pasadena/ W Altadena where our resources are needed and appreciated, but are open to other locations which are easy to access via public transportation. We need enough parking to accommodate our four mobile classrooms, and ideally some aspects of our current “mobile headquarters”. This permanent home will serve as our administrative office, a community hub for artists and neighbors, and a launchpad for our mobile education programs. We plan to design the space so that it can be a resource for our community through a symbiotic relationship with our neighbors. After being “off the grid” for 15 years, we are looking forward to the possibilities that a long term home can afford; sustainable power access, welcoming community classroom space, water access (including proper restrooms) to start. We dream of a place where we can comfortably host diverse communities through artmaking.

Rationale:

The needs of our organization and our constituency have shifted. We have determined our ability to anchor ourselves more securely in our community is key to our momentum and sustainability. In the current climate, there is a growing need for sustainable safe spaces for people to connect and create together. While we deeply love John Muir High School, our location and current mobile facilities are not equipped to support the services and programs that our community has asked us to provide. We will honor our mobile nature through programs that continue to bring art to the people, as we have done for the last 30 years.

The culture of working, learning, and sharing is a defining characteristic of Side Street Projects. We create a space for cyclical dialogue with our community and it is through that dialogue that we have developed a collective vision for the future home of Side Street Projects.

The Garden as a Metaphor:

Side Street Projects makes space for artists to create the conditions for our community to be artists, much like a garden. Some past artist projects have reflected that ethos from traffic islands with tomatoes to FEMA trailers growing lettuce. We built “Our Garden of Dreams” with artist, Dominique Moody, at our current location and it grows without access to running water. We are called to honor the land we inhabit and indigenous wisdom. We feel it is our responsibility to help our community have a safe space to grow healthy roots.

We hope that this move addresses sustainability on an organizational and a community level, while also modeling good stewardship through our relationship with the earth. Adaptive reuse is in our DNA. We love creative problem solving and are open to a range of options from vacant land to an old church, to an obsolete mechanic shop. We have been in dialogue with multiple private foundations who have expressed interest in supporting this venture. Side Street Projects is 30 years old. We have earned our need to grow roots and be the institution that our community asks us to be.