May 21, 2012

Guerrilla Gardener Turns Potholes into Miniature Works of Art

Hi there! How're you doing today? Fill your mug with some Arabica juice and move one of those delectable virtual treats from tray to plate to cakehole. Better a cake hole than a pothole, eh! Steve Wheen realized nobody likes to hit potholes on their way to work, so if authorities weren't going to fill them, he would. Steve became a guerrilla gardener , travelling around the world and turning ugly potholes into charming miniature gardens.

“Guerrilla Gardening has been around for a long time, in fact one of the earliest examples known is when wives of UK servicemen used to go out planting flowers along the train tracks during WW1 so their husbands would have a pretty journey home,” Steve Wheen says, but he's taken it to a level where it's perceived as an art form.

The London-based artist started pothole gardening during his university years, partly to make art, partly as a hobby, and mostly to highlight how crappy East London's streets were. Since then, he's travelled to other big cities, like Milan, to turn potholes into tiny gardens featuring all kinds of small props.

Hey, Steve? When you've got a few years, c'mon over to Thailand. You think you've seen potholes? Even our potholes have potholes! We need you, Bud!

See ya…unless you fall in one of your deeper potholes, eh!

Bob