Newbury Street Mural is Gone

In a city where landmarks' ages are measured in centuries, Joshua Winer's 14-year-old Newbury Street mural had assumed a certain pride of place. Chances are you've seen it, all five stories of it, staring down at you from the huge, exposed east wall of 157-159 Newbury St., formerly the Du Barry restaurant.

The mural, which depicts prominent Bostonians from all eras -- remember Jean Yawkey? -- gathered in a Parisian street scene, has a sentimental history. Rene Rubaud, the former owner of the Du Barry, and James Bennette, an art student turned PR man, decided to use the wall to display student art. In 1991, Winer won the design competition, a $5,000 award, and the chance to put his stamp on the busy intersection of Newbury and Dartmouth streets.

The Bank of Boston -- remember them? -- put up the prize money, billboarders Ackerley Communications donated the work of 17 painters as well as the scaffolding, and the Boston Public Library helped research French art. (Many of the Ackerley sign painters were laid off shortly afterward, Winer reports, as billboard technology went digital.) The result was an amusing and serendipitous portrait of almost a hundred Bostonians, proper, improper, and improbable.

You can see Boston Latin's own Leonard Bernstein chatting with Pops founder Arthur Fiedler, alongside concert pianist Amy Cheney Beach. In a nearby panel, King Gillette is hovering next to Babe Ruth in a Red Sox uniform, with the shadowy Masonic grave-robber (and founder of the New England Journal of Medicine) John Collins Warren very much in evidence.

Anyways, it has since been removed from the side of the building, which was converted into upscale condo's with a new addition of a penthouse. RIP Newbury Street Mural :(