Some basic materials and an afternoon are all that are needed to have your own Station. Some photos of Station construction are included in a gallery at the bottom of this page. I will add more photos soon that show more detail.

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Permanent and Semi-permanent Stations
At this point, each of the Stations has followed the same basic design - two upright poles connected with string or twine. What follows is a general material list and notes regarding construction. 
  • Uprights
    • Metal fenceposts - (those green ones), 3-4 feet in length for a 5 foot station
    • Poles/supports - bamboo works great, find a harvestable source or buy at a garden center   
    • Zip-ties - used to affix the supports to the fenceposts
    • The green metal fenceposts mentioned above can be used to ground the uprights, but if need be you can place uprights in a 5-gallon bucket and add Quikcrete. I like to bolt the upright to the inside of the bucket for stability while setting up. See comments below regarding Mobile Stations.
  • Cross-strings
    • Anything goes! The World's Smallest has used finger-knitted yack yarn, but twine, string and other finger-knitted yarns work wonderfully. If you choose to finger-knit yarn cotton works the best as it does not stretch as much as other yarns. Stretching leads to a lot of sagging.
    • Cross-strings can be wrapped or tied around the uprights or you can affix eye-bolts. 3/16 inch i-bolts that are 3 inches in length have worked for me. Drill holes in the upright and use washers for stability.
    • We would love to see how a wire cross-string system would work. If you try this, let us know!
  • Clothes pins
  • Paper - use something beyond photocopy weight. Thin paper gets brutalized in rain and wind. 
    • Try to find a free source of paper from a commercial print shop. They sometimes have perfectly-sized cast-off pieces.
    • The absolute best is watercolor paper. The paintings look great and it stands up to weather really nicely. Downside: it's spendy. 
  • Paints - Any basic paint set will do.
    • Some get gummy (Prang) when they get really wet. Not a big deal, but it takes forever to dry and work sticks together if you take it off.
    • The basic set of Crayola watercolor paints works well.
  • Water cup/yogurt container. I have spray painted and yarn-bombed these. A touch of glue from a glue gun helps stabilize finger-knitted yarn that is wrapped around the container. 
  • The Sign
    • Public Art Station should be somewhere on the sign. Add any superlatives you want (e.g., Billy's Hot Sauce Public Art Station, Sellwood Public Art Station, Public Art Station Cleveland High School). Some signs include some general directions for artists, but this isn't necessarily needed.
    • Connect folks with your station and Public Art Station in general.
      • Include information to connect folks with your social media pages and to publicartstation.org (please do this!)
      • If posting to Instagram you can #publicartstation (posts directly to the Instagram Feed on this site) and #publicart will connect your station to the larger public art Instagram community. Add any local hashtags that are appropriate.

Mobile Art Stations
Mobile Art Stations are free-standing and can be transported and moved when needed. To date, their design has mirrored that of the permanent Stations with the exception being the use of five-gallon buckets with quickcrete to stabilize the station. Most notes below indicate differences in construction between permanent and mobile Stations. 
  • Base: 5-gallon buckets (keep the handles on)
  • Uprights: Bamboo cut to desired length.
    • I drill two holes in the bamboo and bucket in order to bolt the upright to the bucket. Because the bucket is tapered and the hope is that the upright is vertical, I put wood shims in the gaps between the bamboo and the bucket. 
    • Before I affix the upright to the bucket, I also drill holes for the cross-string eye-bolts. I start drilling from the top and space the eye-bolts 7 inches apart.
    • After affixing the uprights to the buckets, I fill half of the bucket with quickcrete.
  • Cross-strings:
    • Affix strings (finger-knited yarn, twine, etc.) after placing the buckets where you would like them. Some adjustments may be necessary to get the desired tension. 
  • The Sign:
    • See notes above about naming your Station and connecting it to the larger Productive Public Art community. 
    • I create a sign for each appearance of the Mobile Station, drill holes and affix it to an upright using zip-ties. Photo examples are included in the gallery. 
    • I use a wood burner for lettering and a variety of materials when making the signs (yarn, acrylic paint, glue gun, spray fixative).
  • The Table
    • To provide a place for paints and the water container, I zip-tie a piece of wood to the top of one of the buckets. I drill holes into the wood and the bucket to affix the wood to the bucket.
  • Extra Materials
    • I place extra paints and paper (in a zip-locked plastic bag) in the bucket that is not being used as a table. I have a cloth that I put over these materials. 
  • Extra Water
    • I have a gallon milk jug full of water available to change out dirty water. 

Art Stations can be adapted for any space. If you have a design that is different than what is outlined above, let us know so we can add photos and design specs here. Please...

​Photos of Station construction. (I will add photos of details soon.)