KID CITY: CITIES DESIGNED BY CHILDREN

Kid City was a collaborative exhibition between Sadie Jordan and students from four elementary schools across Portland and Gresham. Through after-school classes and weekly one-on-one mentorships, together they have explored the intersection of cities and belonging through art.



Explore cities through the eyes of children at Llewellyn Elementary, North Gresham Elementary, East Gresham Elementary, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School.

All art projects were designed by Sadie, with inspiration taken from the National Building Museum’s Educator Resource Packet.

Everybody’s World by Cash
(One-on-One Mentorship)

Cash is a fifth grade student at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School. He enjoys spending time with family and friends. He likes Tranformers, Ninja Turtles, and Spongebob. Cash is a multidisciplinary artist. In addition to his work in the visual arts, Cash is a member of the rap group The Wildcats. You can check out a performance at: www.ksmoca.com/music-project


Over the course of eight weeks, Cash and Sadie collaborated in designing and creating Cash’s perfect city. They spent weeks exploring a variety of different artistic mediums. During this time they discussed what a city is, how it functions, and what Cash believes makes a city ‘good.’ 



After deciding cardboard and paint pens would be his materials, Cash sketched his designs. Sadie helped cut and paint the base layer of each piece. For the next few weeks, they glued the structures together. Cash painted on each piece using paint pens. Each structure makes up a different part of Cash’s perfect city. He named the city he created ‘Everybody’s World.’



My Perfect City Project

Student artists at Llwellyn Elementary School painted places, people, and things they would want to see in their perfect city. On the tables, there were lists of places you might find in a city for students to reference. Parents were able to engage their children on the topic of urban design as they were painting. Around sixty students from kindergarden to 6th grade participated in the project at their school’s Family Craft Night.


The project was repeated on a smaller scale at North Gresham Elementary School. As a class, the student artists discussed the places in their city that make them happy. They also described the places they would add if they had the choice. Student artists then painted parts of their city to add to



Please feel free to recreate this project with your own students and children. These student artists used acrylic paint on cut particleboard. Each square board was sanded to make sure there were no splinters! The suggested grade range for this project is kindergarden through 6th grade.

Street Names Project

Your city is thinking of renaming a popular street. They want to name the street after someone who is important to you and your neighborhood. Who would you name the street after?

For this project, students at North Gresham Elementary discussed how street signs are often named after important people. They then each made a list of people who are important to them and/or their neighborhood.



With pre-cut and painted cardboard rectangles, the student artists used paint pens to write the name of their street and decorate their sign. They had a list of street types, the word that follows the name of a street to further describe it, and discussed what each abbreviation meant.

These street signs represent who each student considers most important to them and their neighborhood. Izzy chose to name her street after her cousin Niko, Seerat picked her best friend Rita, and Doru wanted to rename the street she lived on after her mom.

Please feel free to recreate this project with your own students and children. The suggested grade range for this project is 1st through 6th.


My Neighborhood Makes Me Feel... Project

Student artists at North Gresham elementary explored how their neighborhoods make them feel by creating abstract art pieces. Each student artist decided individually how their emotions look when expressed through shape and color.

The student artists made lists of all the emotions they feel and the different types of shapes they could think of. Sadie discussed with the class how artists use shapes and colors to express these emotions in their work.



Each student artist then created an art piece about their neighborhood, using their list of emotions and shapes as a guide. Many students used the paint pens to create abstract marks and some chose to write their emotions inside or near their shapes.


For Jaylene, heart shapes and the color purple represent being happy in her neighborhood. In her work, the color green expresses loneliness and blue squares reflect sadness. Jaylene also used paint pens to communicate her emotions through expressive marks.

Please feel free to recreate this project with your own students and children. This project is suited to a variety of mediums incuding paint, paint pens, cut paper, and more. The suggested grade range for this project is 3rd through 6th.