Artist, Community Join Together To Create Bernardsville Mural

BERNARDSVILLE, NJ — Mural artist Caren Frost Olmsted of Basking Ridge is on a mission to beautify cities and towns across the nation with custom-designed, community-created murals.

Locally, Olmsted recently helped create the Bernardsville Mount Airy Road Mural Project which included a new, long-anticipated 650 total square feet mural depicting the historic borough.

The project brought together the Bernardsville community of all ages. Beginning in October 2019, residents gathered to help paint the mural in carefully planned sessions in the Bernardsville Train Station over several months.

"Communities truly benefit from participating and collaborating in the creative process of painting a mural. Having done over 100 large scale collaborative mural projects around the state and beyond, I am always humbled by the enthusiastic contributions of the communities where I get to work. Mural projects like the one in Bernardsville, do not happen in a vacuum — they take the input, heart, and energy of hundreds of people to be successful," said Olmsted, founder of the Olmsted Mural Group.

The mural covers both sides of the bridge on Mount Airy Road and reads "Welcome to Bernardsville" on one side and on the other: "Small Town, Big Community".

"We were so thrilled to install and celebrate this beautiful mural of Bernardsville," said Bernardsville Mayor Mary Jane Canose. "Bernardsville had never done a beautification project of this scale before."

Along with the Bernardsville mural, Olmsted has designed and created more than 250 murals in her career, including murals in schools across New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Washington D.C.; for towns, cities, and community organizations; and many commissioned by private patrons or businesses.

Locally she has created murals for The Seeing Eye in Morristown, The Greater Somerset Hills YMCA in Basking Ridge, and more.

"People always ask me what my favorite part of mural work is. For me, it is the process and the people. Of course, I do my best to make artwork that I am proud of and that all may enjoy, but the collaborative process is where the real heart of the mural project lies and the myriad of people who help create it," said Olmsted.

Follow Caren Frost Olmsted/Olmsted Mural Group on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. For more information, visit cfodesigns.com or olmstedmurals.com.

For mural inquiries for your city, school or business, email info@cfodesign.com or call 908-208-7516.

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