A ribbon-cutting and grand opening ceremony is planned for a project in Jefferson that took several years to come to fruition.

The west alleyway in downtown Jefferson called Imagination Alley will be celebrated with a ribbon cutting at 5:30pm on Friday during the Starting Block Party. Chair Jean Van Gilder says the idea first came about in 2021 to re-do the west alleyway with a children’s theme since the alley leads to the library. Van Gilder says Nevada artist Kelsey Wilson designed and painted the fairytale mural on the north wall and included augmented reality that can be accessed through the app “Overly” on any smart device.

“What it is, it’s kind of like an animator doing frame-by-frame. And so when you put the Overly app up there it moves it like a little movie. We’ll show you how to locate where those are when you come to the opening. But it’s really fun.”    

Van Gilder says there are other features in Imagination Alley such as benches, including a butterfly metal bench that was created by another artist, Hilde DeBrune, along with a wall for a backdrop to take a selfie and there’s a metal sign about books leading to adventures at the east entrance. The Starting Block Party is from 5-7pm to also celebrate the evening before the Market to Market Relay that is happening Saturday morning.