Walls of the City (Street Art)

Toronto's street art is at its most alive and most constantly changing along the laneways of Queen Street West. This private walking tour goes well beyond pointing at pretty murals: it is a guided way into a subculture with its own language, its own rules and an ongoing conversation with the city. Before you go in, your guide introduces the vocabulary of tags, throw-ups, pieces, burners and wheatpaste, so that what first looks like colourful chaos begins to read as a visual language.

The centrepiece is Graffiti Alley, nearly a kilometre long, running just south of Queen Street between Spadina and Portland, where the walls have been overwriting themselves since Style in Progress began hosting legal sessions there. Uber5000's tribute to Toronto icons, from Gord Downie to the Blue Jays and the city's raccoons, sits beside political pieces, portraits of hip-hop icons and work by international artists, and your guide explains who made them and why.

From the alley, the walk continues through the surrounding laneways to the Ossington Alley murals and, time permitting, the Drake Hotel corridor.