67Welcome to Downtown Waco East
Hand-painted wall sign for ABC Flooring, 618 Elm AvenueSIGN
A flooring store painted a mid-century travel poster on its own wall and named the neighbourhood while it was at it.
Green and cream, on a white-painted brick wall that has been patched a dozen times: a banner reading Welcome to the, then WACO in fat sans capitals, then East! in a big optimistic script with a sunburst behind it, and a border of little diamonds top and bottom. It is a 1950s postcard, painted at wall size, on a working flooring shop.
And then, in the same lettering and the same green, the phone number and ABC FLOORING — because the sign is not being nostalgic. It is trying to sell you carpet.
The reason it matters is the word order. Downtown Waco East. Not East Waco, which is what the rest of the city says; not the Eastside, which is what the wall two hundred feet from here says. Downtown — east. Somebody stood on this corner and decided that the middle of town is wherever you happen to be standing, and painted it ten feet tall in the one place where nobody could argue.
Is this your wall?
This page is how people find this piece — and it has room for your name on it. If you own the building, made the art, or want to welcome visitors standing in front of it, we would love to put your story here too.
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