Note: Authored by David Menconi, this piece has been produced in partnership with Raleigh Arts. Menconi's latest book, "Oh, Didn't They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music," was published in the fall of 2023 by University of North Carolina Press. His podcast, Carolina Calling, explores the history of the Tar Heel State through music.

One of the coolest and most desirable neighborhoods in the City of Oaks is Boylan Heights, sitting on the western edge of downtown Raleigh. Generations of alternative-rock fans know the neighborhood’s name from a 1987 album by local stars The Connells. And nowadays, Boylan Heights has a growing reputation as a thriving hub for arts spaces.

In fact, there are enough art studios, workspaces and galleries to comprise an emerging Boylan Arts District, which will be spotlighted on a tour happening the afternoon of Sun., Sept. 28, 2025.

Seven spots around Boylan Heights will host open houses that day, including Crawlspace Press/Pocket Gallery on South Street, Birdland on Mountford Street and Rebus Works and Antfarm Studios right by the Boylan Avenue Bridge.

The Raleigh Trolley will provide free service along the tour route from 2-5pm that day, making stops along the way.

^{A needleprint artwork of Community Deli in Raleigh by Caitlin Cary}

“This studio-tour model has been a real successful happening for artists in more rural places like Chapel Hill and Hillsborough,” says participating artist Caitlin Cary, whose needleprint works will be among those on display at her husband Skillet Gilmore’s Crawlspace Press space. “People seem to like not just seeing the art, but also getting a peek into different artists’ processes to make it. It’s great to see a thing like this organized around a really old, established community neighborhood that’s full of cool, arty people.”

In total, around 20 different artists will have work on display at various venues in a range of media—ceramics, painting, glass, print, textiles and more. The September tour is the second such Boylan Arts District event, following a highly successful debut in March 2025, and they should continue to happen twice a year going forward.

[Editor's Note: A similar community event, the Boylan Heights ArtWalk, will take place for the 33rd time this December.]

The Boylan Arts District has its origin in an earlier initiative, the Grid Project. Started by a group of local artists including Pete Sack and Jean Gray Mohs, the Grid Project started out as a collective doing pop-up art shows using vacant storefronts around the area.

“The purpose of the group was to occupy these unused spaces with art, and also to connect different siloed components of the creative community,” says Sack. “In reaching out to different studios and arts entities in Boylan Heights, we asked if they wanted to have open house tours of their studios. Everybody jumped on board.”

The artists are obviously hoping that people on the tour will be moved to purchase the art they see. “Please buy stuff so we can keep doing this,” Cary says with a laugh—but there’s a larger attention-getting purpose to these open-house tours.

“The first tour we did was wildly successful,” says Sack. “So the plan is to grow incrementally from that. It’s a way to introduce Raleigh to the neighborhood, shine a light on these different creative entities. Even with the landscape changing so much, there are still a lot of cool things being done by creatives living in Raleigh.”

The Boylan Arts District Studio Tour is 2 to 5pm on Sat., Sept. 28, 2025, with seven stops at art spots throughout downtown Raleigh’s Boylan Heights neighborhood. It’s free, with the Raleigh Trolley providing transportation on a circuit that begins on the east side of Project Enlightenment on Florence Street.