Discover Wauwatosa: Art, Parks, and History

Explore Wauwatosa through a range of interests: permanent murals and historic places sit alongside parks, a wooded area, and a local market. If you’re looking for a hotel in Wauwatosa, these themes can help you choose the focus of your trip. The offerings differ not only in their subject matter but also in their format, from permanently displayed art to a recurring live painting competition.

Art and History in Wauwatosa

The North Avenue Mural Arts District, or NoMAD, features permanent murals in Wauwatosa designed by artists. This means art here isn’t limited to a single event: the murals are described as a permanent part of the district. If you’re interested in art in public spaces, you can explore this alongside the city’s historic places.

ART 64 takes a different approach. The recurring live painting competition turns the Village of Wauwatosa into an open-air gallery. Unlike the permanently displayed NoMAD murals, the focus here is on painting as part of an event. Check the specific dates before your trip if you’d like to include ART 64 in your plans.

The Kneeland-Walker House is a historic Victorian mansion with gardens. Its architecture and gardens make it a different historic landmark from the Wauwatosa Historical Society’s experiential history series, which includes a puzzle game set in historic Wauwatosa. Since individual program items may change, it’s worth checking the current program before your trip. This lets you distinguish between a historic building and a history-themed game.

The Wauwatosa Historical Society’s walking tour series is free to use on a mobile device or print before your visit, and provides a self-guided way to explore Tosa. It offers a different format from the puzzle game: one is a self-guided walking tour, while the other is a puzzle set in a historic environment. Mama Rosa, Wisconsin’s first troll, is located in Firefly Grove Park. The artwork is made entirely from recycled materials from Wauwatosa’s urban forest. Mama Rosa thus brings together an artistic figure and the origin of its materials, while NoMAD focuses on murals.

Parks, Forest, and Recreation

Hartung Park brings together several distinct landscape features: the grounds are hilly, and there are trails, a pond, and a stone labyrinth. There’s also a playground and outdoor fitness equipment. If you’re comparing parks by their different features, you’ll find both landscape elements and facilities for play and exercise here. You can choose based on what interests you most in a park visit without reducing its different features to a single activity.

The Forest Exploration Center offers a different nature-focused perspective: it is a 67-acre, mature hardwood forest in the center of Wauwatosa. Whereas the named features at Hartung Park include trails, a pond, a labyrinth, and facilities, the Forest Exploration Center is defined by its size and forest type. This distinction can help with planning if you’re more interested in a park with several specified amenities or a larger wooded area.

Firefly Grove Park is also home to the Pump Track, which is considered the first of its kind in southeastern Wisconsin. Its multidirectional design includes various transfer points, two wall rides, and two deep bowls. These design details and individual features give you a more specific idea of the facility than the term “Pump Track” alone. You can consider the Pump Track as a separate attraction alongside the art in the same park without treating the two as the same offering.

Market and Village of Wauwatosa

The Tosa Farmers Market is located along the Oak Leaf Bike Trail. It features Wisconsin farmers, food producers, and local vendors, as well as educational offerings. This sets it apart from art and park destinations, with its focus on producers, products, and learning. It’s a helpful guide for planning your trip if you’d like to include local vendors and educational offerings alongside attractions.

The Village of Wauwatosa combines historic architecture with a walkable setting. Along with the city’s various art and history offerings, this provides another perspective on Wauwatosa: the Village is about architecture and a walkable setting, while NoMAD, ART 64, and the Historical Society each offer different cultural formats.

Explore more destinations: River Hills, Shorewood, St. Francis, Milwaukee, Brown Deer, Glendale, Cudahy, Whitefish Bay.

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