Women of Willimantic
Ben Keller + Rene Montalvo
📍 17 Walnut Street
A 50-foot mural honoring Toni Morrison, former Eastern president Elsa Núñez and former Connecticut governor Ella Grasso.
Source ↗
🎨 QUIET CORNER FIELD GUIDE
The Quiet Corner Art Hunt
Murals, sculpture, roadside oddities and public art hiding around Windham + Tolland counties.
Free + low-cost exploring
Windham + Tolland Counties
Walking + driving stops
Downtown Willimantic mural by Ben Keller. Photo:
Eastern Connecticut State University.
ART HUNT 01
🎨 Willimantic Mural Walk
If there’s one true public-art destination in the Quiet Corner, this is it. Willimantic Public Art maintains a town walking tour and opened a new Riverside Drive Art Walk, while downtown has accumulated murals from local and Connecticut artists over several years.
Town of Windham Mural
Ben Keller
📍 979 Main Street
A downtown piece documented in Keller’s public mural portfolio.
Artist source ↗Within Reach
Ben Keller
📍 948 Main Street
Another Main Street mural that makes downtown itself feel like the gallery.
Artist source ↗EASTCONN LEAP Mural
Ben Keller
📍 1320 Main Street
A large-scale community mural at the EASTCONN Community Learning Center.
Artist source ↗Riverside Drive Art Walk
Multiple artists
📍 Riverside Drive area
Willimantic Public Art says the Riverside Drive Art Walk is now open, with multiple works along the river-side corridor.
Official guide ↗Thread City Crossing
Frog sculptures by Leo Jensen
📍 South Street over the Willimantic River
The four giant frogs perched on thread spools turn a highway bridge into one of Connecticut’s strangest pieces of civic art.
History ↗🐝 BUZZ TIP: Don’t try to make the six cards above the entire Willimantic experience. Willimantic Public Art’s own walking tour covers more pieces, so use this as your starter route and keep your eyes open.
ART HUNT 02
🌿 Mansfield + Storrs Art Hunt
Mansfield’s public art is less concentrated than Willimantic’s, but there’s a surprisingly good cluster: a nature-inspired Artwalk, the town’s MLK mural, a giant weaving sculpture downtown and major outdoor works on UConn’s Storrs campus.
Grow Artwalk
June Bisantz
📍 Start: Mansfield Public Library, 54 Warrenville Road
Fifteen double-sided outdoor signs pair local flora and fauna with words like Emerge, Lead, Persist and Grow, guiding visitors toward the Nipmuck Trail at Southeast Park.
Official guide ↗Martin Luther King Mural
Emida Roller + community participants
📍 Mansfield Community Center, 10 South Eagleville Road
A quilt-inspired MLK39 mural developed with community input and mounted across the front of the Community Center.
Official guide ↗Weaving Shuttle
David Boyajian, 2015
📍 Betsy Paterson Square, Downtown Storrs
A larger-than-life stainless-steel weaving shuttle that nods to Mansfield’s historic silk industry.
UConn source ↗Dove Tower + Inverted Pyramid
Ilan Averbuch, 2004
📍 Behind UConn’s Information Technology Building and Homer Babbidge Library
Granite and steel create one of the most recognizable outdoor public-art installations on the Storrs campus.
UConn source ↗
Want to keep going at UConn?
The Connecticut Office of the Arts catalogs a much larger Storrs public-art collection, including works by Richard Hunt, Jackie Ferrara, Jun Kaneko and others. We’ve kept this guide focused on easy outdoor stops rather than turning it into a campus catalog.
Browse the state collection ↗ART HUNT 03
🗿 David Hayes Sculpture Fields
This one deserves its own outing. The David Hayes Sculpture Fields spread modern steel sculpture across former sheep meadows, orchards and woodland at the artist’s Coventry property. The Town of Coventry lists it as open every day during daylight hours with free admission.
📍 905 South Street, Coventry
🐝 BUZZ TIP: This is probably the best “I had no idea this was here” stop on the entire guide. Give yourself time to wander instead of treating it like a quick roadside photo.
ART HUNT 04
🚗 Quiet Corner Roadside Art Hunt
This is the part that feels most like the Quiet Corner: a town-history mural on an auto shop, art hidden down a conservation trail, a painted silo and one famously frog-shaped boulder.
🏭
Rockville Mural
Laura Costello
📍 75 Windsor Avenue, Vernon
Valley Falls Farm, Fox Hill Tower, Talcott Mill, Tunnel Road and more are packed into a mural that took roughly 150 hours to paint.
Town source ↗🥾
Crystal Peat Trail Mural
Tolland High School art students
📍 Crystal Peat Conservation Area, Cook Road, Tolland
An old concrete industrial wall has become a mural stop inside the conservation area. The town’s own trail brochure points walkers past it.
Trail brochure ↗🐸
Frog Rock
Roadside landmark
📍 Route 44, Eastford
A giant painted boulder that looks like a frog, because apparently northeastern Connecticut decided normal roadside landmarks were boring.
CT Tourism ↗🌸
Rural Radiance
Ben Keller
📍 Mapleleaf Farm, 768 Gilead Street, Hebron
A huge floral silo mural on a working dairy farm. Best treated as a roadside art stop unless the property invites you farther in.
Artist source ↗🌏
Sabaidee
Ben Keller
📍 NK Asian Market, 18 Furnace Street, Danielson
A mural celebrating the area’s Laotian community and one of the strongest public-art finds in Killingly.
Artist source ↗💧
Holt Memorial Fountain
Historic civic art
📍 In front of Warren Memorial Town Hall, Stafford Springs
The 1890s fountain remains one of downtown Stafford Springs’ most visible historic public-art landmarks.
Town source ↗Private-property reminder: Murals visible from public streets are included as visual stops, not invitations to enter private property. Park legally, stay out of working areas and follow posted signs.
BONUS DESTINATION
✌️ Putnam: Teach Peace
RiseUP’s Public Art Northeast initiative began with this large-scale MLK39 mural at the Hale YMCA. Artist Emida Roller’s piece places Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. alongside local civil-rights figures Prudence Crandall and Sarah Harris.
KEEP LOOKING
👀 More Art Worth Finding
These aren’t full routes on their own, but they’re good detours if you’re already nearby.
Israel Putnam Monument
📍 Brooklyn Green / 25 Canterbury Road, BrooklynA major equestrian monument tied to the town’s namesake Revolutionary War general.
Garden on the Bridge
📍 WillimanticThe old 1857 mill crossing was repurposed as a pedestrian garden, giving the Frog Bridge area another odd little visual stop.
History ↗More UConn Outdoor Art
📍 Storrs campusThe state collection includes works by Richard Hunt, Jackie Ferrara, Jun Kaneko, Wopo Holup and others.
Browse collection ↗Willie Nelson Mural
Ben Keller
📍 Good Times Coffee House, 1548 Main Street, Willimantic
One more Keller piece if you’re already doing the Willimantic route.
Artist source ↗HELP US BUILD THE GUIDE
📸 Found One We Missed?
There’s almost definitely more public art hiding around Windham and Tolland counties. If you know a mural, sculpture, painted barn, strange roadside piece or another stop that belongs here, send it over.
