by Haley Cullingham

If you’re strolling down King Street to look for expensive furniture, make fun of tourists, or just listen to the bells from St. James Cathedral in the next few months, stop by the Sculpture Garden to see the newest piece of urban surrealism hiding around a corner in Toronto. As if the traditionally eclectic St. James combination of nodding-out junkies and dining-out couples set against a gothic church backdrop wasn’t fantastical enough, Katie Bethune-Leamen has built a giant piece of woodland art, to make art in. Exactly what it sounds like, the Mushroom House will be Bethune-Leamen’s studio until next April, and all are welcome to stop by and watch her work, think, or climb the ladder into the mushroom cap and ponder the cityscape. I wasn’t lucky enough to see the artist in action when I stopped by this weekend, but I did get to glimpse her minimalist in-mushroom studio, decorated only by a picture of Tupac taped to the wall. Fresh.   

The Sculpture Garden
115 King Street East
Daily 8am – Dusk
Free Admission