Swarthmore community members may have noticed the two bright, colorful murals recently painted outside the Swarthmore CO-OP and the new Celia Bookshop. Both artworks are part of Swarthmore Town Center’s (STC) mural initiative to beautify the town and the business district, developed in collaboration with Media, PA, artists Beth Clevenstine and Paul Santoleri, and Italian artist Pepe Gaka.
The initiative began in 2022, when John C. Kennedy, a local resident and retired woodworker, approached the STC board with a $5,000 seed fund and the idea of installing murals in town. The funds were left over when the old Community Center, which Kennedy had helped run, closed in 2020 after Swarthmore College, the building’s owner, chose not to renew its $1/year lease.
“We need more art in Swarthmore, and it seemed like we had many walls that could be filled with interesting subjects,” Kennedy said in an interview with The Phoenix, reflecting on what inspired the project.
STC quickly came on board with the pitch. The funds Kennedy brought were held by the Swarthmore Centennial Foundation, a local nonprofit that supports betterment efforts throughout town, effectively serving as an incubator for the money. A mural subcommittee was formed in early 2023, consisting of STC board members, community members, and local artists.
The committee initially reached out to Ship Bottom Brewery to propose a mural on their building. They issued a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) to mural artists and selected four out of twenty applicants to submit initial designs, which were paid for. However, the brewery’s owners did not approve the designs, and the project eventually failed to launch.
“We learned a lot through the process and a key takeaway was that the building owners really need to be involved and engaged in the selection process, rather than our committee just making a recommendation,” Sarah Matthews, director of STC, told The Phoenix in an interview.
In the spring of 2024, STC reconvened the mural committee for a new project on the Swarthmore CO-OP wall on Lincoln Way.
“We wanted it to feature local nature, vibrant vegetation, trees, fruit gardens — which all reflect the CO-OP mission of enriching the community by providing high quality, locally sourced foods and groceries,” Matthews said.
This time, seventeen mural artists responded to the RFQ, and three designs were selected, including one by Clevenstine and Santoleri, and another by Gaka. The committee and the CO-OP board of directors ultimately contracted Clevenstine and Santoleri for the CO-OP mural, which they painted between August and September 2025.
According to Matthews, the CO-OP mural cost around $25,000, far exceeding the original seed funds provided by Kennedy. Fortunately, the Swarthmore Centennial Foundation agreed to cover the full cost. “They funded the entire CO-OP mural with that seed money from the old Senior [Community] Center,” she said.
Matthews told The Phoenix that one of the mural’s highlights is its glass mosaics. “We were thrilled when Beth [Clevenstine] said she would be able to do mosaics and add some accents to the wall,” Matthews said. “They just look stunning. If you catch them in the sunlight, they sparkle.”
Santoleri, Clevenstine’s life partner and collaborator, discussed their creative philosophy and the process of community involvement in an email to The Phoenix. “A mural such as this is a reflection of the community where it exists,” he wrote. “We, as artists, responded to the desires of the community and invited that community to participate by contributing to the mosaic through our workshop at the start of the process.”
For Santoleri, a mural creates a shared experience through collective viewing, and involving the community in the creative process embodies a democratic approach to art. “The artwork is essentially a product of local involvement,” he added.
The mural on Celia Bookshop came about when the bookshop owners, Beth Murray and Rachel Pastan, reached out to the committee in the spring of 2025 to commission a mural for their side wall along the alley. This time, the committee did not issue a new RFQ. Instead, Murray and Pastan were asked to review the proposals submitted during the CO-OP mural selection process, and they chose Gaka to design the piece for their building.
The Celia building, where the bookshop is located and named after, was constructed in the 1920s by Italian immigrant and shoemaker Joseph Celia and his family. After learning about the building’s history from the committee, Gaka designed a mural featuring an open book that reads “The Art of Shoemaking, by Celia.” The mural was recently completed on Oct. 23, and a ribbon-cutting was held the next day.
“[Murray and Pastan] wanted to honor the legacy of the building as a former shoe shop, and the fact that it was an Italian family that settled there, and then we got this great Italian artist to come do the mural. It just sort of tied it together,” Matthews said.
The roughly $2,300 mural cost was split in half between the Swarthmore Centennial Foundation and Murray, the building’s owner.
These two murals, and the work of the mural committee align with STC’s mission to beautify downtown Swarthmore, are part of a broader effort to support the public spaces. In the past, STC has funded the string lights throughout the Ville, the metal bike sculpture in Centennial Park, and a display board next to it. According to Matthews, STC is now considering joining the state-wide PA Downtown initiative and the national Main Street America program to gain access to state and federal grants.
Both Kennedy and Matthews hope to help bring more murals to Swarthmore in the future. They’re exploring the idea of a mural on the Chester Road overpass, above the tunnel that cars pass through when entering town, and are eager to work with any business owners who want to get involved.
“The small business owners are the lifeblood of the town center,” Matthews said, “and we hope to benefit from the murals as an incentive for people to visit town.”
