Twenty minutes from my office

The weather is so beautiful lately - on days like these I love to take walks during my lunch hour. And west Philadelphia has some very interesting places to walk around.

For example, just five minutes away is this street art titled Re:flect, several tall shiny rectangles filled with live plants.

And just past Re:flect, a church that has recently lost its steeple. I don't think they are planning to replace it.

It's an old church, originally built by German worshippers, now home to a Baptist congregation. The little wooden angel still greets everyone who passes by.

It seems as though there is a church on every block, sometimes two or three of them. I pass a few, then come to The Cloisters, one of the most interesting housing projects I've ever seen:

It's a Catholic cathedral that was sold several years ago and turned into an apartment complex for low-income residents. What a spectacular apartment entrance!

The box to the right of the front doors contains buzzers for the apartments.
The neighborhood is not too great, in spite of those elegant cathedral apartments. Mysterious warnings are found:

It's hard to believe that anyone lives in this building, but apparently someone is viewing satellite TV around here:

There are uplifting murals:

But also lots of buildings that have been abandoned for so long that quite large trees have grown through them:

I head back toward the office, stopping once again to Re:flect.