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Finding Ruska Street Backyard: Wroclaw's secret alley of street art

Finding Ruska Street Backyard: Wroclaw’s secret alley of street art

If I asked you what European cities are well known for street art, Wroclaw probably wouldn’t be one of them.

In fact, this pretty Eastern gem has some of the best street art in Europe.

Public art pieces are scattered about the city. The famous gnomes (of which there are over 300) challenge any visitor to discover their many locations. Other life-like statues of people or farm animals can be spotted on the sidewalks in both open areas and side streets, waiting for the unsuspecting visitor to walk by and notice.

There are also a number of drab back alleys that have been transformed to vibrant and decorated masterpieces. We passed the entrance to Ruska Street Backyard twice before we finally found it. The alley doesn’t appear in Google Maps, so we could only go off the vague explanations provided on a few websites we’d found describing the location.

Ruska Street Backyard Map

The entrance looked as though it was just a driveway leading between two apartment buildings. It wasn’t until we’d begun making our way down that its hidden secrets revealed themselves.

A million different colours were splashed onto every possible surface and crawled up every wall as high as they could reach. Even drainage pipes and exhaust units had been decorated with patterns and drawings, making a normally inanimate object into something worth looking at.

The alley stretches between Ruska Street and Świętego Antoniego, sneakily utilising the narrow leftover space between the buildings surrounding it. To find the alley, head west along Ruska Street and it will appear on your left.

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

Ruska Street Backyard, Wroclaw

It was obvious no one knew about this place, we were the only ones exploring it. It was our little secret.

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