Portland's Northeast Alberta Street is now lined with colorful galleries and boutiques where visitors can browse for street art, shop for a handmade felt hat, overhaul a bicycle with used parts and get acupunture treatments at a tea shop.Much of the district's commercial revival can be traced to Roslyn Hill, a civic-minded landlord who began purchasing the street's vacant buildings and aging auto shops in the early 1990s and renting them to gallery operators and designers. Ms. Hill had a couple rules: No metal bars on windows and no locked doors during business hours.
By 1997 galleries were sponsoring monthly art walks and the momentum hasn't stopped. One of the best times to stroll Northeast Alberta Street is on a Sunday when 20-somethings walk their dogs, cyclists meet in cafes and a woman sells tamales from a cooler.
Sunday is also a good day to visit the street's indie fashion boutiques and graphic design studios. Shop owners are usually around and happy to chat, giving Northeast Alberta Street the air of a working artists' colony.
(Photo credit: Basil Childers)
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