Tenderloin National Forest

A previously drug and trash riddled alleyway in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood is now a colorful and verdant oasis, dubbed the Tenderloin National Forest.

In 1989, an artistically driven nonprofit called the Luggage Store Gallery annexed the adjacent alley, which the city ended up leasing to the group for $1 per year. Soon the area was transformed, bringing a speck of nature and art to what was long one of the San Francisco’s most notorious neighborhoods.

Today the alley walls are covered in neighborhood art and shaded by four-story-high redwoods, among a variety of other plants.