Four years at Villanova don’t just come with defining moments. They come with defining corners.
Some of those corners are unanimous, like the St. Thomas of Villanova Church, which every Villanovan will step into at some point during their time here. For others, perhaps a bench outside Mendel or a walkway from West Campus holds meaning.
Then there’s the small underpass on the way from Main Campus to South Campus. A trapezoidal wall underneath the SEPTA stop that is home to a mural showcasing each and every one of those corners.
And it just got a fresh coat of paint.
The Inspiration
Redoing the mural has been a vision long in the making. The initial mural was painted a decade ago on the 10th anniversary of the St. Thomas of Villanova Day of Service. But the chipping paint and moss growing underneath the mural was nothing short of what Student Body President, Aleko Zeppos, referred to as an “eyesore.”
“This was my passion project,” Zeppos said. “My freshman into sophomore year in SGA, when I was just a first year senator, the leadership at the time was trying to get this mural project off the ground. I went back and looked at the actual email chains on the SGA email, and they had a design in place, [but] nothing ever happened.”
Two years later, Zeppos sent an off email that would result in a chain reaction of events.
The Process
The first hurdle was getting approval. While the mural is on Villanova’s campus, the bridge that the mural is under is SEPTA property, which meant that SGA had to go beyond Villanova administration.
“It was government relations, the township had to sign off, we also worked with Chris Kowalski from our government affairs office…there’s a lot of steps we had to go through,” Zeppos said.
Once the approval was underway, Zeppos and SGA were eager to get the process started, and were hoping the mural could be done over the summer.
“We sent out a form during our tabling sessions to the student body, in our newsletter…we were hoping to get design submissions,” Zeppos said.
Cue the Day of Service component.
Amidst all the student designs and submissions was a note from Victoria Diaz, the St. Thomas of Villanova Day of Service Student Chair, who suggested making the mural renovation of a Day of Service project.
“I didn’t even have to say yes,” Zeppos said. “It was a no brainer. It would symbolize 20 years of service and 20 years of Father Peter.”
From there, the next step was to decide on what the mural would look like. Students throughout campus submitted different designs—some by hand, others digitalized—until SGA, Day of Service and the University settled on a combination of ideas, spearheaded by the Liberal Arts Senator, Brady Keane, who did the final mock-up of the mural.
“I worked with a lot of brighter colors, and I took inspiration from old school postcards,” Keane said. “The ones from around the world that say ‘greetings from,’ and they have that kind of big, bold lettering. We took that idea out, put that as the backdrop and just kind of filled in from there.”
But it wasn’t just Keane’s vision. It was a group effort – with the most help coming from Cecile Madonna.
Madonna is the owner and founder of Lola Love Letter, a graphic design studio based out of Elizabethtown, PA. Her first introduction to Villanova was painting shipping containers for the Opus Prize that were later turned into a museum. With her first job at Villanova being so successful, Villanova’s Director of Student Involvement, JJ Brown, was eager to welcome Madonna back to Lancaster Ave.
“JJ came to me and said ‘Hey, you want to paint a mural again?’” Madonna said. “And I thought, ‘What a great project.’ I was really excited about both of those opportunities, because they both allowed the students to have a paint day, both for the shipping container and for this. I love being able to help create those little special moments where people [can] pick up a paint brush and participate in the activity. I think that’s really special.”
But the list of contributors didn’t stop there. Beyond Madonna, Brown also coordinated SGA and Day of Service board members with the Campus Activities Team (CAT), to ensure the mural was being looked at from every lens on campus.
“Campus Activities Team does a lot of programming and events for our students,” Brown said. “They see so much and so they could give a different student perspective.”
Once all of the student leadership groups were set in place, Madonna took to AI to culminate the students’ visions and bring them to life. She loaded the design on an oculus and drew the mural onto the wall digitally, saving her hours upon hours of drawing by hand.
“Honestly, [the design] was beautiful to start with,” CAT President Evelyn Haines said when she first looked at the mural in early September. “But every opinion is valuable and that’s why we brought in the rest of [the] CAT executive [board]. We added more than took away, but we only added details that we [thought] would accentuate campus more…and really emphasize some of the beautiful details about [Villanova].”
The Details
There was one sentiment everyone who contributed to the mural agreed on: the mural had to have enough detail that every time a student walked by, they would notice something new.
“As a mural artist, as a graphic designer, I’m super big into storytelling,” Madonna said. “Each time you look at [the mural], you can pick out something different to kind of focus on. And that’s why murals engage people. There’s a little something for everyone in here to pick out and then connect to.”
The first decision was what buildings would be showcased on the mural. They decided on three. The first is Alumni Hall. Built back in 1848, Alumni is the oldest building Villanova has still standing. The second is the St. Thomas of Villanova Church, the epicenter of Villanova’s campus. And the third is none other than the Finneran Pavilion, home to the basketball programs that help put Villanova on the national map.
Beyond the buildings are the other aspects of the mural that help to represent what being a Villanovan means.
The iconic Will D. Cat mascot, who is sporting a Day of Service t-shirt on the mural. The plane that reads “Leo XIV,” waving a “Veritas, Unitas, Caritas” banner to symbolize the core Augustinian values that shape Villanova’s culture. The clock from Mendel circle. The street sign pointing to Tolentine, South Campus and Cabrini – intended to reflect the past, present and future of the University: the flowers that bloom all over campus in the spring; the Oreo, for obvious reasons; the iconic brick path students walk on to class; and even Taffy, the Public Safety facility dog, is featured. No detail was spared.
But beyond including each of these campus elements, the students who spearheaded the project focused on the idea of commemoration.
“There’s these beautiful butterflies on the mural, but they’re not there just because they look beautiful,” Zeppos said. “They’re supposed to be a tribute to the student we lost last year, Addie [Fiscus]. We had some folks in SGA that were very close to her, and we found out that butterflies were very symbolic for her—a special thing in her life. We wanted to include that for her.”
The goals of the mural were clear: to commemorate, honor and bring each corner of campus to life.
“I think that’s my favorite part about it,” Haines said. “You literally can’t look at a part of it and not see something that doesn’t represent one group or another, or everyone for that matter. We tried to make it so that there wasn’t just one group of students represented, or you’re only getting 95% of people in this mural. We wanted to get everyone.”
