Isaiah Zagar covered a South Street lot in mirror, tile, bottles and bicycle wheels. Step back and the pieces become faces.
You have to step back from a wall at Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens before it tells you what it is. Up close, it’s a thousand small pieces of mirror and tile, glass bottles and bicycle wheels. A few steps back, the pieces line up into faces and scenes.
I’m a details person, so this place had me from the first minute.
About Philadelphia Magic Gardens
Watch the recap: See Philadelphia Magic Gardens on my YouTube channel. Subscribe to Miss Renee Explores and follow @missreneeexplores on Instagram for more places to discover.
Philadelphia Magic Gardens is a nonprofit that preserves the work of mosaic artist Isaiah Zagar, and the museum at 1020 South Street is the biggest piece of it. Isaiah and his wife Julia moved to South Street in 1968. Julia opened Eye’s Gallery, a folk art store, and the two of them lived above it. Isaiah started covering the building in mosaic, and that became his first art environment.
In 1994, Isaiah bought the building that now holds the museum and fenced off the two vacant lots next door. The gardens grew out of those lots. Over his lifetime he made more than 200 mosaics on public walls, mostly around Philadelphia and in other places too. Isaiah has since died, at 86. Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens, the nonprofit he founded, keeps the work going.
What I Loved
The whole time I walked through, I kept thinking about Harriet the Spy. There’s a scene with a garden full of wind chimes, where Golly takes the kids and lets them drink the “champagne” that was probably soda. That scene has lived in my head for years, and the Magic Gardens pulled it right back out.
I loved the small messages worked into the glass and the bicycle wheels around the garden. One read “one would like to have a life.” Another, a set of eyes and beneath it said “Whatever form of expression.” I also found a piece of ironwork shaped like a hand.
Mosaics fascinate me as an art form. Isaiah placed the shattered glass so carefully that the big scenes only appear when you back away from them. I’m the person who is always zoomed in on the small details, so seeing work from someone who zooms out and holds the whole picture felt like a wonder.
The Studio and the Mural Map
The museum has a second site. The Magic Gardens Studio at 1002 Watkins Street is a former auto repair shop where Isaiah started working in 2007. He and Julia gave it to the nonprofit, and it opened to the public in 2024. It isn’t open for daily admission. Guided studio tours (60 minutes, $25 per person, booked ahead) were paused for renovations at the time of writing, so check their site for the return date.
Isaiah’s murals are all over South Philly, and the museum keeps a mosaic map so you can find them: https://www.phillymagicgardens.org/map/. His work shows up in California too, including a mural in Alameda. Have you ever run into public art in a city you didn’t expect it in?
Planning Your Visit
Address: 1020 South Street, Philadelphia, PA 19147
Hours: Wednesday through Monday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Closed Tuesdays. Hours change for special events, so check their calendar before you go.
Tickets: Book ahead on the museum’s website. General admission tickets go on sale one month in advance and often sell out earlier in the day, especially on weekends and holidays. Current prices are listed on their site.
Studio: Not open for general admission.
A lot of what’s in those walls started as something broken. Somebody picked each piece up and decided where it belonged.
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