More than sixty Seattle artists and musicians have hand-painted over forty full-size salvaged doors. They're finished. They're in storage. We're looking for businesses to host them. One door, one storefront, for the length of the run.
See hosting options Email usFour steps, and we do most of them.
A spot outside or just inside your business where a full-size door can stand safely. We handle the brackets, the anchors, the weatherproofing and the install.
The doors already exist — painted, sealed and photographed. You'll see the finished collection and tell us which ones fit your block. One door goes to one business at a time.
Each door carries a tag. Tap it with a phone, scan the code, or type it by hand — a free story opens in the browser, along with a profile of the artist who painted that door.
The page a stranger sees when they scan your door credits you as its host. You're also a marked stop on the public map people follow between doors.
Every level covers the artist, the hardware and the install. Nothing is charged to the public — the doors are free to see, always. Hosting places a door at your business for the run; the doors stay part of the collection and travel on.
The doors aren't for sale. Hosting puts a finished work outside your business for the run and credits you for making that possible. When the run ends the door goes back into the collection and on to the next block — that's what makes it a citywide project instead of forty separate decorations.
The artists choose what they paint. Every door in the collection was painted before anyone sponsored it. If a new door gets made during the season, the artist picks the subject, the style and whether they want to do it at all. Hosting buys a stop on the route and the work of getting the piece up — it doesn't buy art direction.
One door, one business, at a time. Doors go out individually so no single storefront turns into the whole show, and so the route stays worth walking.
Seattle already walks. Belltown, Georgetown, Ballard, Capitol Hill and Pioneer Square all run monthly art walks that put people on the pavement looking at work. A door outside your business turns you from a storefront people pass into a stop on the route.
People photograph them. People stop and scan them. And unlike a printed ad, the thing outside your door is an original artwork by someone who lives here — which is a different kind of association to buy.
To the artist, and to the physical work of getting the door up: mounting brackets, masonry anchors, exterior sealant, transport, and the tag itself.
The art is already made. We just need places to put it.
Bob's Doors is a project of Catalyst Arts, a Washington nonprofit collective built to make sure artists in this city get paid and get credited.
Tell us where you are and what your frontage looks like. We'll come look, and we'll bring photos of the doors.
Email us about hosting