With the exciting growth in mural art in St. Thomas in recent years, there is substantial interest from emerging artists and students in this globally significant art-form. Throughout 2026, our team at Andrew Gunn Consulting and young & free press will be introducing a series of new initiatives designed to support and expand opportunities for artists in the community.
Fun news! The Port Stanley BIA is working in collaboration with Andrew Gunn Consulting and the team at young & free press to add new artwork in the village. Port Stanley is one of the great tourism destinations in Ontario and has a lovely, walkable core and vibrant harbour. This new project – titled ‘Making Waves’ – will run through 2026 & 2027.
With the possibility that the City of St. Thomas might wish to develop an ‘Arts & Culture Master Plan’ for the community, our team offered to generate an early overview of what shape this could take. We are grateful to the St. Thomas Economic Development Corporation for the opportunity to consider the potential for arts and culture in the city. Throughout 2025, our team met with community members to gather input, and as part of our ‘Students Build Cities’ program with Thames Valley District School Board, we received lots of feedback from local students as well.
We are thrilled to begin introducing our Students Build Cities projects for 2025-26! First up, we are excited to develop a new ‘neon trail’ for St. Thomas. Participating students will have the opportunity to consider the significance of neon signs in urban spaces, learn about how neon signs work, and then imagine and design new installations for the community.
Our team is absolutely thrilled to be launching a new mural project in collaboration with the Downtown Strathroy BIA! Located just west of London, Strathroy has a lovely, walkable core area with perfect opportunities for spectacular outdoor artwork.
St. Thomas is growing! With new private and public sector investments happening city-wide, the expectation is that the population will grow from 45,000 to nearly 80,000 by 2050. Naturally, this means that we need to consider what the community will need in the future, including essential infrastructure, transportation improvements, parks and recreation amenities, new schools, and much more. In this light, what is the future of the local arts & culture sector?
We all know the quiet arc of growing up in a small city or town. Elementary school, high school, and then the decision – where do we go for college or university? If we choose to stay home, where do we work and where do we live? If we go away to school, should we return home at some point? If so, when is the best time to do so? Or should we stay away forever?
Our team at young & free press is thrilled to be involved with the development of two fresh park spaces in downtown St. Thomas. Over the past year, we have worked in collaboration with the Parks, Recreation and Property Management department at the City to develop preliminary concepts, and early designs have been prepared by Arthur Lierman Landscape Architecture.
Over the past five years, our team at ‘young & free press’ has focussed on coordinating the installation of large-scale murals around southwestern Ontario. After the murals are painted, often we are asked for ‘before & after’ photos, as viewers are curious about how this kind of artwork helps to transform urban spaces.
St. Thomas is home-base for our team at young & free, and we are very excited by the potential growth of the city following the announcement of the new Volkswagen / PowerCo EV battery plant set to open in 2027!
Our team at young & free press is thrilled to help announce a new donation of $15,000 to the Elgin County Railway Museum to introduce cycling tours to St. Thomas! With the funds, staff members will purchase a fleet of new bikes, including two e-bikes, and coordinate guided tours that feature the rolling stock gallery at the Museum, the collection of large-scale murals in the city, and the St. Thomas Elevated Park.
Our team at young & free press is thrilled to help introduce a spectacular new mural by artist Meaghan Claire Kehoe inside the London International Airport. Both the origins of the image and the purpose of the artwork are significant.
Beginning in summer 2023, the team at the STEAM Centre in St. Thomas will coordinate a new engagement project that will invite community members and visitors to produce artwork outdoors! Imagine painting at the St. Thomas Elevated Park, or in the new Westlake-Evans Civic Park downtown, or at other beautiful locations around the city … this is the goal for summer 2023 in St. Thomas! Our team at young & free press coordinated a contribution of $7500 to help make this program happen.
On November 8, 1946, Viola Desmond went to a movie at the Roseland Theatre in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia. She sat on the main floor – the whites-only section – unaware that she had purchased a ticket for the balcony, where Black audience members were expected to sit. Although she offered to pay the extra cost for a seat on the main floor, she was removed from the theatre, held in jail & charged. This incident of racial discrimination helped to ignite the civil rights movement in Canada. More than seven decades later, in November 2018, the new ten-dollar bill design featuring Desmond went into circulation across Canada, acknowledging the Halifax-based business owner who altered the social history of the country.
Our team at young & free press is thrilled to help announce a donation of $5000 to the St. Thomas Public Library to support musical performances on-site. Specifically, the funds will be used to invite musicians to play at the library in the new indoor / outdoor space that will connect the Library to the Westlake-Evans Civic Park, which is currently under construction next door.
Encounters @ 365 Talbot is an interactive art installation by Maddie King and Andrew Gunn in downtown St. Thomas. In August 2022, eighteen vintage mirrors were placed in the walkway at 365 Talbot Street, each one drawn from a different city or town in southern Ontario. The mirrors complement the stunning mural on-site by artist Stephanie Boutari. This is a managed installation, and the depth of the piece is meant to be revealed gradually.
Our team at young & free press is excited to announce a donation of $275,000 from a generous local donor to the Elgin-St. Thomas Community Foundation. The funds will be used to enhance the downtown core of St. Thomas.
With increasing numbers of newcomers moving into the London, St. Thomas & Elgin County area – and lots of tourists visiting, too – there is the opportunity to consider how to make everyone feel welcome as quickly as possible. The STEAM Centre and Catfish Creek Conservation Authority have taken an interesting approach by introducing multilingual signs on local hiking trails.
Hey London! There are lots of reasons to check out the new play Grand Ghosts running until November 5th at the Grand Theatre on Richmond Street. Members of our team at young & free attended the play on opening night, October 21st. Afterwards, we came up with our top five reasons to attend the show.
In Simcoe, the aspirations of the community have outgrown the dated atmosphere and decaying built environment. There are lots of young entrepreneurs, artists, and cultural leaders who want the town to grow, but have to face empty storefronts, bland scenery, minimal nightlife, and very little foot traffic. When I started with young & free press two years ago, the mission was to get more people interested in imagining the future of Simcoe. This is truly ‘step one’, as we need to have community members willing to make the effort to inspire change.
