Painted Transformer Boxes Keep Fort Collins Pretty and Interesting, But We Aren’t the Only City!

As you wander around Old Town, or anywhere in the city of Fort Collins, you will notice that the transformer electrical boxes aren’t dry, green and rusty. In fact, they are distracting in a way that is completely different than “Get that ugly green box out of my front yard.”

This is because Fort Collins is celebrating the 9th year of covering dull transformer boxes in different, colorful murals. You cannot miss them. In fact, I saw four just walking a block of Muntezuma Fuller Alley in Old Town.

They really draw your attention and spruce up the neighborhood. I can’t say how many times I have walked past plain and ugly transformer boxes on sidewalks and thought “If only this giant box wasn’t in my way.” When they are painted, I tend to go out of my way to cross the street to look closely at the details.

In fact, we aren’t the only city doing this. Other cities in Colorado, like Loveland, also hire local artists to paint the boxes located all over sidewalks and parking lots.

If you extend the search outside of Colorado, you find that there are cities all over the country, such as Arlington, Massachusetts, and San Diego, California, repainting these commonly found electrical boxes.

Here is an article a travel blogger wrote about the beautifully painted boxes in Sofia, Bulgaria. The blogger Steve Hanisch commented positively on the transformation of these electrical boxes, “with paint and creative ideas you’re able to create a huge effect.”

The reaction to these make-overs has been overall positive. The artist and blogger behind the blog Re-Purposeful Painter, Mollie Freeman, paints transformer boxes in the city of Loveland. In a blog post she wrote about the project, she said, “I love it when something positive and fun replaces something ordinary, boring, or ugly. This is certainly a function of art.”

I agree with Mollie. I have heard it said that they paint the boxes with murals to prevent gangs from tagging them with graffiti. If this is the case or not, the murals give the transformer boxes a bigger purpose in our city than electricity. They make you want to look twice or walk up and examine the details. They boost the attractiveness of our sidewalks and alleyways.