The staircases of the neighborhoods of Findikli and Cihangir in Istanbul have undergone a makeover as Huseyin Cetinel has decided to paint them in all colors of the rainbow.
Done to make people smile, the retired forestry engineer spent nearly US$800 on this endeavor, taking four days to paint these stairs with help from his son-in-law.
Soon, many people started posing for pictures near these stairs, while the LGBTQ community claimed the space for their cause.
A few days later, the city council had re-painted these stairs to their original color—a dreary gray.
Upset that they couldn’t claim this space as their own, residents started organizing themselves via Twitter, and re-painted these stairs to brighten up the city once more.
View more photos of this creative project below.
[via Street Art Utopia and The NY Times]