SAN DIEGO COUNTY, Calif. — Have you ever looked at a view with a building in the way and said "I wonder what it would look like if the building wasn't there?" So did Russ Murfey and his brother Scott with their building at the entrance to Windansea Beach on Westbourne Street in La Jolla.
"We always thought it would be cool to look at the building and look right through it and see the ocean, the shack, and the surf right down below," said Russ.
Not being artists Russ and Scott were looking for one when they found Liza Stout's art in a sandwich shop.
"We saw her art and before you knew it, we had a mural," Russ said.
Here's where it gets more interesting. Liza was not from Southern California but instead from Steamboat Springs, Colorado - ski country - and had to figure out what the Murfey brothers wanted.
"They felt nostalgic about the area, so we worked on a stylized Windansea," she said.
Stout has been an artist for as long as she can remember working as an illustrator but this only her second mural.
"With this, I really wanted to focus on the strong mood of the waves in La Jolla, especially at Windansea," she said.
As an artist, she became fully immersed in her work
"We went swimming yesterday in the waves," Stout said. "They were the most intense I've ever swam in."
Coming from the mountains, she has a special relationship with nature.
"I really grew up with that connection with nature," she said. "You have a lot of surfers here and there's a similar connection."
And what are the hopes of the mural?
"Hopefully, it can influence other people to do fun stuff around the neighborhood," Russ Murfey said.
"That something is so beautiful in its simplicity, that's what we were trying to capture with this," Stout added.
So now instead of saying turn at Westbourne to get to Windansea Beach people can say turn at the mural and head west to Windansea.