Parkdale Mural Project

Neighbourhood: Parkdale · Address: Queen St W between Dufferin and Roncesvalles, Toronto, ON · Hours: Mon–Sun 24 hours · Price Range: Free · Editorial status: Not yet verified

Why Visit

The Parkdale Mural Project transforms gritty backstreets and busy corners with epic-scale works from some of Toronto’s wildest muralists. It's a living outdoor gallery that changes with the neighbourhood, perfect for spontaneous art discovery.

What Makes It Unique

Unlike expensive mural hubs or polished street art districts, Parkdale’s murals are scattered on everything from laundromats to old rooming houses—canvas choices feel spontaneous, urgent, and raw. You’ll find both international collabs and hyper-local artists repping everything from Ukrainian folklore to bubble-blowing cloud monsters. The sheer volume and variety in such a small, walkable stretch is rare in Toronto.

If you’re the kind of person who slows down in subway stations to look around instead of staring at your phone, the TTC Public Art Program is going to be very much your thing. Toronto doesn’t treat transit art like an afterthought. On the original Yonge-University line especially, station art is part of the identity of the system, and some stations are worth stopping at even if you’re not getting off there for any other reason. What makes it fun is that the work isn’t tucked away in some side corridor with a little plaque nobody reads. It’s built right into the commute. You’ll see mosaics stretched across walls, sculptural elements above platforms, and full environments that change how a station feels when you move through it. Some pieces are subtle and easy to miss if you’re rushing for a train; others are impossible to ignore. Spadina Station is one of the best examples. The mosaics there are playful, graphic, and unmistakably tied to the station’s own visual language. They’ve become one of those TTC details locals recognize instantly. Osgoode Station’s chandelier is another one people remember. It adds a slightly theatrical note to a station that could otherwise feel purely functional, and it catches you off guard in the best way. The nice thing is that seeing the art doesn’t require planning your whole day around it. You can build a loose self-guided crawl just by riding a few stops and getting off where something interests you. St. Clair, Museum, Dupont, Glencairn, and Union are all worth paying attention to, and even stations that aren’t famous for one signature piece often have details that reward a second look. Museum Station is especially fun if you like design that leans a bit dramatic; it’s very much trying to make the station itself part of the story. Go on a weekday outside rush hour if you actually want to look. Around mid-morning or early afternoon, the platforms are still active enough to feel like the city is in motion, but you’re not being herded along by a wall of commuters. That matters, because this is art you experience while people are living around it: trains arriving, buskers playing in connecting corridors, station announcements echoing overhead, someone hustling to make a transfer. It’s not quiet-gallery art. It’s public art in the most literal sense. A practical tip: just use a PRESTO card or tap your credit/debit card and make an afternoon of it. Stay behind the fare gates and hop station to station without exiting if you want the easiest route. Wear comfortable shoes because some of the stations involve more walking, stairs, and tunnels than visitors expect. And keep your eyes up. A lot of the best work is above you, along tiled walls, or placed where you only notice it once you stop trying to get somewhere quickly. It’s cheap, it’s distinctly Toronto, and it turns an ordinary subway ride into something much more observant and memorable. Even locals who’ve been using the TTC for years still have stations they love for the art alone.