Kansas City is known for a lot of things but widely known for its Barbecue. However, along with all the street corners, you will come across murals. So while you are hunting down those barbecue joints, take a moment to check out these Kansas City murals for some great Instagram photos.
Quick Trip Overview
- Location: Kansas City, Missouri
- Closest Airport: Kansas City International Airport
- Time of Year: February
- Time: 3 Days
- Estimated Cost: $1000 (Airline tickets, hotel, food)
Kansas City Murals
The buildings in the Kansas City area are covered with murals. Walking the streets the variety of murals will range from monsters, to text, to whiskey bottles or wine bottles. It’s an amazing visual experience and leaves you wondering what will be around the next corner. I will be going over some of the most popular Kansas City Murals. The murals are part of an art project making them easy to locate.
Annual Kansas City Mural Festival
For the last three years (2017, 2018, 2019) Kansas City has hosted its own Mural festival. During this time period – such as September in 2019 – 40 artist spent a week creating new murals across Kansas City. Attendees to the festival were encouraged to watch the artist at work and to engage the artist in the process. Learn more about the festival and look out for 2020 festival.
The Mural Art Project
The main one of focus is going to be on the corner of Oak and 17th Street in Crossroads. This is just down the street from the popular Power and Light district.
This entire street section was an art project. Since the start of the art project, there are numerous murals along the different “sections” of wall. You can enjoy a variety of artist in just a small section of street.
This makes for a great adventure no matter the weather, as you can see even when it is snowing and night time the murals are beautiful to photograph.
Community Shelf
Address: 114 W 10th St, Kansas City
My personal favourite “mural” is the one painted on the side of one of Kansas City Public Libraries. It’s easiest to find by looking for “Community Shelf” in google maps. On the side of the library is painted the spines of famous books. I was able to get a photo with my personal favourite that is painted on the side: Catch 22. You will find a bunch of popular books painted on the side of the building. Just watch out: it’s a dog relief area.
Power and Light District
Take a stroll through the power and light district and you will find more of the Kansas City Mural vibe. Beautiful art showing the history of the city and the passions: jazz and barbecue! Just walk amongst the bars (great place to break for some drinks) and you will find art on every building corner.
Crafted in Kansas City
Are you a Kansas City native? Did you get engaged to someone from Kansas City? Met the love of your life there? A great opportunity for a photo shoot for those occasions is at the “Crafted in Kansas City” mural.
Address: 2616 Guinotte Ave, Kansas City, MO 64120
Kansas City I’m So In Love
Address: 2010 McGee St, Kansas City, MO, USA
There was once a very popular mural in Kansas City, which is featured here:
It was then painted over unexpectedly. The original shop owner expressed concern after seeing people in the parking lot for their photo shoots. Read more about the story here. However, no worries! It has been recreated by this lovely mural artist. So you still have a chance to check it out!
So hopefully you are able to find some of the amazing murals found across Kansas City. There is a great walk to reach a majority of them – something you will need after all the BBQ that the city is notorious for!
I LOVE seeing graffiti from around the world! That community shelf is really neat. Great photos!
So much beautiful street art! I think I agree with your favorite too – love that idea especially for a library. The map at the bottom is great!
+1 for loving the library mural! What a fantastic idea! 🙂
I mean, these are all awesome, but seeing giant books just makes me happy!
Wow! that library mural is just awesome. I had no idea the Kansas City area had such a thriving artist community. I really love that so many streets around the world have been taken over by art.
I love how much street art has proliferated around the Midwest, especially! Kansas City seems like a fun town to explore, it’s been 20 years since I used to visit there regularly.
I Love a city with street art and Kansas seems to have a lot of it, would definitely love to explore the city and see them for myself
I love seeing posts like this, really shows off the creativity of local artists and a way to view the city in a different light. Love the books art I’ve never seen anything similar before.
I didn’t know that Kansas City is such a great place for murals! I love street art! I especially love the one with the books!
I never would’ve pegged Kansas as a city to have so much interesting street art! Perfect for instagram lovers!
This is epic , creative , fun and so much love put into it. I am in love with art like this on the streets. It shows such growth in a city.
Oh my goodness this is my favourite. I LOVE street art, I could wander quirky cities like this forever! I especially love the community shelf one too, what a neat idea!
Wow the one outside the library is beautiful, murals do catch my attention everywhere I go, and this ones are pretty impressive!
It has been a few years since we have visited Kansas City, but I would love to go back to enjoy some of these murals. How odd that the owner painted over such a famous mural because people were taking picture of it. Of course, my favorite is the mural at the library. It’s charming.
These are seriously beautiful. Its amazing how creativity can be expressed. Your post reminded us of Penang. Loved Community Shelf. What a unique idea. Now we feel like visiting Kansan in person after seeing your beautiful life-like photographs!
Hey, great post! If you love Street Art check out Street Art Chat on Twitter and add your pics! These are so awesome!
Really awesome photos and incredible art. Street art has a cool way of sending messages in big and beautiful ways! Love that you incorporated some Instagram posts in here as well 🙂
The library mural looks amazing! I’d visit Kansas only to see that! <3
I love street art and Kansas City obviously has a lot to offer. The ‘bookshelf is amazing’! Very nice collection, thanks for sharing.
I’m a sucker for awesome Street Art, but never knew Kansas City was big on it! I can’t wait to get there and check it out 😉
Wait these murals are so cute and so down to earth! I love that Kansas City has so much pride!
Love the Community Shelf mural, so clever
I love city murals! The community shelf and Kansas City I’m so in love are perfect – glad they repainted the second one! We have a few really good ones here in Minneapolis as well. There’s one with the words “i like you” painted in various colors, that’s a popular one for engagement photos!
I would have never thought Kansas City had so many murals! This reminds me of Wynwood here in Miami!
What a find. Didn’t realise Kansas had such a great collection of street art. Thanks for bringing this to our attention.
Great graffiti! I didn’t have any idea Kansas had so much street art to offer.
That book mural is amazing! Definitely worth travelling to see.
I LOVE murals a lot, so guess I need to go to Kansas City! Especially like that jazz one!
These are such great murals! I know Kansas City has great BBQ, but I’ll definitely have to checkout the murals! Loved this post!
It’s refreshing to see someone post about murals (somewhere else than Miami). Glad know Kansas had a thing for murals too! Gorgeous photos!
Visiting from #blogpostsaturday, pinned, flipped and tweeted your article!
I love street art. These are so beautiful. Love that you included a map!
Who would have thought Kansas City has such amazing street art?? I’m very impressed and have to see this for myself!
I love the community shelf one!! Beautiful! I never knew that Kansas City was a street art destination
I’m always looking for murals, street art is just such an interesting part of a city. I didn’t know that Kansas had so many cool ones! Great post!
I’m a big fan of murals. And here I can see a variety of them. Loved the books one. I think I have seen it somewhere else also.
Noting it to see when I visit Kansas. 🙂
Love the street art! Great introduction to the city. Hope to visit one day and check out all the graffiti art =)
Aw I love cities with great street art! The I’m so in Love murals are so cool – every city should have one – so photo-friendly 😀
These are beautiful and so unexpected! I love the one with books 🙂
Oh great! Love walking guides and street art! Great photos, really give me a good sense of the area. Never been to Kansas City but I’m trying to visit more of the States next year so maybe I’ll be able to add this to my list!
These are some dandy walls. Pity that things get painted over but then they morph into something else or in your example, they’re recreated. I’d love to spend days wandering Kansas City and documenting all this.
Wow some amazing art! Such fun!