A few months ago, Treehouse Coffee Shop on West Side Ave reached out to me on Instagram and asked me if I could help them get a mural done on the building next door on a large empty wall that is attached to non-profit organization House of Faith. I responded to this message in less than two seconds and said, “Absolutely, I have just the artist for this.”

I’ve interviewed Distort, an incredible local artist, a few times on the blog and I am honored to call him a friend. I reached out, told him about this initiative, and he was all for it. The idea of being involved in something so positive was really awesome to me. Fusing everything I love into one: street art, small businesses, and helping the community.

All that being said, this mural was a lot of work for Distort and we are raising some funds to pay for paint and supplies, so we created a GoFundMe page. Any amount helps!

Treehouse Coffee Shop, House of Faith, and ChicpeaJC are excited to partner with Distort to bring art and light to a building on West Side Ave and Ege Street in Jersey City’s West Side.

We need your help to make this mural come to life!

About House of Faith

“The House of Faith, Inc., runs a transitional housing program for the homeless in Hudson County. We are located at 244 Ege Avenue Jersey City.  We opened our doors 18 years ago and have run a successful program assisting our clients in need with housing and supportive services.  In 2017 HUD decided to shift their focus towards rapid re-housing which meant we would be starting a new program but would not receive funding for our current transitional housing program.

Knowing how well our clients have succeeded in our transitional program over the years we knew we could not close down, the need for housing and supportive services is still so prevalent.  We had to let go of all our staff except for myself and our case worker, we now volunteer our services to keep this program alive and operating because we believe in the work that we do and know how many people have succeeded along the way.  We have wonderful volunteers who assist us as much as they possibly can with our facility, but as you can imagine we are running on a skeleton crew.

Having this mural going up outside our building brings me so much joy and I know will lift the spirits of all our clients who see it.  My great aunt was a nun (Sister of Charity) she started this organization because she believed that every person deserves to live their life with respect and self worth.  She has since retired now but I will forever be indebted to her for giving me the knowledge and drive to keep going even when things seem hopeless.  Those are the exact things we instill in our clients, We want to ensure that when they leave our doors they leave with their heads held high, knowing they are moving onto a self-sufficient life, back in control of their future.

To help with the mural:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/tree-house-mural-love-with-distort

House of Faith Amazon Wish List

https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/2XRZ5YGWPMMLX?ref=cm_sw_em_r_wl_mw_OSaxAPMJr1aSh