Mural Stories
Selected projects that take a closer look at how location, scale, and place shape each mural.
Savannah Vibes
Savannah Vibes was created inside the Savannah Vibes shop on Broughton Street, one of the city’s busiest pedestrian corridors. The mural spans roughly 30 feet wide by 15 feet tall and sits directly behind floor-to-ceiling windows, making it fully visible from the street at all hours of the day.
Because of its placement, the mural needed to function less like interior décor and more like a storefront beacon, something that could stop people mid-stride on a crowded, tourist-filled block. Color and contrast were critical. Saturated purples, pinks, and teals were chosen specifically for their ability to hold intensity in bright daylight and remain electric after dark.
The imagery pulls together many of Savannah’s most recognizable landmarks like the Forsyth Fountain, the Cathedral Basilica of St. John the Baptist, the Savannah City Hall dome, and a river landscape anchored by the Talmadge Memorial Bridge. These are icons many visitors expect to see, but here they’re treated less like postcards and more like raw visual material.
Layered supergraphic stripes, multiple drop shadows, and a slightly surreal color treatment push the composition into a more psychedelic space. Even the sun is rendered in a distinctly 1980s vaporwave style, giving the mural a playful, almost trippy energy that contrasts with the city’s historic architecture.
The creative direction from the shop owner was intentionally minimal. His only request was that the mural be bold, eye-catching, and filled with recognizable Savannah imagery. Once the initial drawing was presented, there were no requested revisions which is a rare opportunity that allowed for complete creative freedom and some of my most expressive work as an artist.
Today, Savannah Vibes functions as both artwork and visual magnet. It draws people into the space, anchors the storefront along Broughton Street, and offers a high-energy introduction to the city before visitors even step inside.
Tybrisa Street Mural
The Tybrisa Street Mural was commissioned by the Main Street Association of Tybee Island and, at the time, was the largest mural I had created. Stretching approximately 165 feet long by 10 feet high, the mural was painted on a split-face masonry block wall along Tybrisa Street, one of the busiest and most heavily trafficked corridors on the island.
Tybrisa Street is lined with restaurants and shops and leads directly to the pier and beaches at the south end of the island. Nearly every visitor to Tybee passes through this stretch, which meant the mural needed to read at many speeds: up close for pedestrians, and in long continuous sweeps for people moving down the street toward the water.
The wall itself presented a major physical challenge. The deeply textured masonry made it the most complex surface I had painted up to that point, demanding extreme precision and the use of specialty masonry paint far thicker than standard exterior coatings; a combination that slowed the process to nearly twice the expected pace. Beyond the surface, the project also involved coordinating with a large group, which can sometimes complicate the creative process. In this case, the collaboration was unusually smooth. The Main Street Association began by referencing existing work of mine to define the overall tone they were looking for, then followed up with a short list of themes and icons important to the community.
Because of the wall’s length and the number of coastal elements to be incorporated like the Tybee Island Lighthouse, egrets, sea turtles, etc, I chose to structure the mural as a sequence of connected vignettes. Flowing wave-like graphics and radiating light patterns carry the eye across the full 165 feet, allowing each section to stand on its own while still functioning as part of a single continuous composition.
The mural took four weeks to complete during the height of summer 2024, with constant foot traffic passing by the site. Locals and vacationers regularly stopped to ask questions, watch the progress, and offer encouragement which turned the painting process itself into a public, shared experience.
Today, the Tybrisa Street Mural functions as both a visual landmark and a narrative backdrop to one of Tybee Island’s most active streets. It reflects the pace, personality, and coastal identity of the area while grounding the artwork firmly in the place it was made for.
The Laundry Diner
The Laundry Diner project focused on hand-painted signage and lettering rather than a traditional mural. The work came out of an earlier collaboration with Two Tides Brewing, whose owners were in the process of rehabilitating a 1950s building into what would become The Laundry Diner.
I began by painting the diner’s exterior and interior logos on brick using thick masonry paint (it’s like painting with pudding), a must-have for durability and proper adhesion on brick. While I typically paint my own designs, the logo for this project was created by local studio Modbird Creative. The mark aligned naturally with the retro visual language I’m drawn to, making it an easy and enjoyable collaboration.
In addition to the logo work, I was invited to design all of the lettering wrapping around the diner’s 50-foot-long stucco marquee. During the building’s rehabilitation, original pamphlets from the site’s former life as a launderette were discovered. Using those materials along with additional archival research I developed a custom typeface based on 1955 launderette pamphlets, allowing the new lettering to feel historically grounded rather than purely nostalgic.
A final component of the project involved cleaning, restoring, and repainting the building’s original cast iron “Laundry” letters. Working with existing historic signage presented a unique challenge, but one that felt important to preserving the building’s character.
The finished exterior now gleams, balancing new life with historical continuity. Collaborating closely with the clients to align the custom lettering, restored signage, and Modbird’s logo resulted in a cohesive visual identity that feels both intentional and rooted in place.
The Lost Square
The Lost Square mural was created for a rooftop bar located above The Alida Hotel in Savannah’s Plant Riverside District, a relatively new area of downtown that has quickly become one of the city’s most active destinations. Surrounded by shops, restaurants, and seasonal outdoor markets, the site attracts both visitors and locals, with a Lost Square a great social focal point to take it all in.
The mural wraps across six exterior brick faces, spanning roughly 40 feet in total width, with each panel standing 14 feet tall. Painting across multiple planes added both visual opportunity and technical complexity, especially given the deeply textured brick and mortar. As with several large-scale exterior projects, the work required thick masonry paint to ensure durability and adhesion, while maintaining consistent linework across uneven surfaces.
The Lost Square team and their brand coordinator came to the process with a solid brief centered on celebration, discovery, and whimsy. Certain elements, including the shuttlecock and logo, were pulled directly from their internal brand book, while the majority of the imagery was developed specifically for the space.
Concepts like paper airplanes launching from open luggage referenced the constant flow of travelers through the area, while raised hands clinking cocktails echoed the bar’s social atmosphere. Repeating arch motifs were incorporated to mirror the large arched warehouse windows on the building’s exterior, grounding the mural in its architectural context. Keyhole motifs were developed as full-scale focal panels within the mural, reinforcing the themes of mystery and discovery. Positioned on opposite sides of the wall, the paired scenes play with perspective, one looking inward toward a lively bar scene, the other meeting the viewer’s gaze directly and creating a subtle sense of exchange.
Multiple design iterations ensured the mural balanced these ideas without becoming overly literal or esoteric. The final composition landed on something sophisticated but playful, and utilized a limited color palette pulled directly from their brandbook to keep the mural visually cohesive with the rest of the space.
Because the bar operates later in the day, the mural was painted during early morning hours before opening. Working at that hour meant watching the sun rise over the Savannah River for several weeks — a rhythm that directly informed the graphic sunray motif that radiates through the background of the mural. An absolutely cathartic cap to ending the holiday season as well as my fourth year as a full-time artist.