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October 1–11, 2026
SEPTA Suburban Station + Walnut–Locust Concourse

This October, DesignPhiladelphia is collaborating with SEPTA and additional partners to transform Suburban Station and the Walnut–Locust Concourse into destinations for design and engagement during the 2026 DesignPhiladelphia Festival.

From October 1–11, these highly traveled public spaces will host exhibitions, installations, marketplaces, discussions, and interactive experiences that invite Philadelphians to see these everyday spaces differently. Places known for a quick coffee or a bacon, egg, and cheese on the way to work will become settings for creative exchange, gathering, and discovery, with the potential to rival the quality of public space found just above Suburban Station at Dilworth Park and throughout the city.

Across the festival, a range of DesignPhiladelphia partners will bring their own perspectives and creative practices into the stations.  If you are interested in more information about the SEPTA activations and exhibitions, be sure to stop by our Festival Hub in the former Cafe space at Temple University Center City (TUCC) -- event fliers, a SEPTA map and DesignPhiladelphia ambassdors will be there to guide your SEPTA-filled DesignPhilly experience.  While at TUCC, explore an interactive exhibit experience presented by MIWA.

On the first Friday of the festival, October 2nd -- check out the expansive and diverse work of Philadelphia architect's with AIA Philadelphia's member exhibition in Suburban Station.  Philadelphia is home to one of the largest architectural communities in the country and the work of this community is impressive.  While you are already in the Station, grab a front row seat to a debut fashion show starting at 7pm from Varvara "Bobby" Diakonenkova, a Drexel Alum who appeared on the most recent season of Project Runway, with a new colleciton from her brand Most Hated, called Dear Philly. Registration required for fashion show.

Around the corner from the AIA exhibit, in a space named "Platform X" United Street Art’s STEP OUTSIDE presents a new exhibition, the "Evolution of Revolution: a History of Graffiti," DesignPhiladelphia is partnering with STEP OUTSIDE by connecting Philadelphia’s design community with the graffiti writers, sticker artists, and street artists who have long claimed public space as their canvas. Four chairs are being transformed into original works of art by streets artists and displayed as part of the exhibition, with collaborative merchandise available for sale.  The collaboration will continue on October 7 with Design Outside: Who Designs the City?  Architecture critic Inga Saffron and Streets Department founder Conrad Benner will explore the shared and contested ground between the design world and the street art world, and what each reveals about the city we build and the city we claim.

Suburban Station will also serve as a setting for Preserving Black Presence, an exhibition led by Community Design Collaborative. The multi-year Philadelphia initiative confronts cultural erasure and strengthens historic Black heritage spaces through community-centered design. Its first site partner is The Colored Girls Museum, a living monument honoring the stories and everyday experiences of ordinary Black women and girls. The exhibition brings together local designers, community leaders, and public programming developed alongside the initiative.

At Suburban Station’s open-air lightwell, DumoLab Research from the University of Pennsylvania’s Stuart Weitzman School of Design will bring biomaterial research into the built environment through a site-specific installation. Directed by architect Dr. Laia Mogas-Soldevila within Penn’s Department of Graduate Architecture, DumoLab translates research from biomedical engineering, life sciences, and vernacular architecture into regenerative building materials, biodegradable products, and living systems that sense and respond to their environment.

On the final day of the festival, DesignPhiladelphia will take over the Walnut–Locust Concourse for a Philly Design Market featuring artists and designers curated by Almost Famous, Vintage Design Market. The market will activate a space with a story of its own. The South Broad Concourse, connecting Walnut-Locust Station to City Hall, sat closed for six years after shutting down in the summer of 2020. It reopened permanently in June 2026 following safety, lighting, and security upgrades, revealing a corridor transformed by public art. The concourse features a mural by Philadelphia-based artist Lauren Cat West, created with lead teaching artist Alvin Tull, alongside 200 painted columns completed by local community members through a collaborative work program with Mural Arts Philadelphia and the City of Philadelphia. Hop on SEPTA and make a day of it: explore the festival underground, then head above ground to Center City District’s Open Streets on West Walnut Street,

Together, these activations turn SEPTA’s everyday spaces into places for encountering design, meeting others, and experiencing Philadelphia from a new perspective.