The Polk / TL Art Walk

The Lower Polk Art Walk wore a few names and styles. The constant: first Thursday, 15–20 galleries, framing shops, and café exhibits open to 10pm for a public night of art. Identity, wayfinding, web, photography, venue wrangling — community events are systems, not a one-off flyer.

Ran with Shell Thomas of the Mayor’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development — immense effort for a two-person core. Across the years I shipped several websites and brands; frames below are the matured identity from the final period. Venue list, schedule, sponsorship, print, CMS, email, social all had to move together.

Today's stack for the same monthly walk

Today I’d run one Figma design system for print, web, and environmental graphics. Claude-class agents would draft venue blurbs and route-map variants; Cursor would pressure-test CMS templates. When the venue list, map, or sponsor set changes Thursday afternoon, automations fire downstream: posters, web listings, email, and social regenerate from shared components without redrawing the soul of the walk.

Peers (galleries, city partners, volunteers) connect to the same design engine: tokens + components + agent prompts for on-brand kits. Walking the street with a paper map and a live logistics graph plus component library are the same problem at different resolutions — design systems, event logistics automations, Cursor/Claude, generative photo variety.