The Wanderer: Rediscovering home through urban wandering

A few weeks ago I went to a virtual screening of PechaKucha (look it up, you won’t regret it) and stumbled across a wonderful initiative in Rhode Island, an Instagram account called the_hidden_worlds_of_pvd, which chronicles the adventures of Justin Foster, who has dubbed himself an “urban wanderer.” 

Foster defines it simply: “Urban wandering is the deliberate act of taking the time to explore an urban setting. I mean for me, now it’s a little more intense because I am looking for places and things I haven’t seen before. Trying to catch a moment in the city where things just bloom. It’s not hard. It’s just a mindset, but certainly the challenge of finding something wicked cool, some place or view that no one has really seen before, is there. There doesn’t have to be a plan or a pre-established amount of time (although that can certainly help since it is very easy to lose track of time in the city), but it should be a deliberate and active choice to take yourself on an adventure, to look at the city and accept what you will find.” 

For Foster, it started at a young age when he could bike to Rocky Point Park during the wintertime. Its abandoned façade, that had once been so busy and bustling, had him in awe, and he was hooked. He’s come back to his urban wandering many times throughout his life, but said that it’s become incredibly therapeutic during the pandemic. Not only is urban wandering socially distanced, but it allows us to see the city we love in a new light, and it allows those of us mourning for the adventures we lost this year to find solace in an element of magic in the day-to-day. 

Foster appears to fall in love with many things he finds on his adventures, and it’s one of the reasons I love seeing Providence through his eyes. A few of my favorites on his Instagram include a broken fire hydrant, placed so simply you wouldn’t have noticed it. Or if you did, maybe it made you consider calling Mayor Elorza to complain, but through his eyes you see how the city appears behind it, and there’s something there you hadn’t seen. Or, a door to what appears to be nowhere, that I assure you I plan on finding as soon as I don’t need a jacket to go outside. Files encourages people to get outside, find themselves amongst the noise, and slow down. See the world around them. Appreciate where they are and see if there’s something they haven’t seen before. 

Of course, Foster has found weird stuff. Lots of graffiti, some of which led him through a visual maze leading to a series of pornographic images. “You find weird stuff in Providence, I mean, you find weird stuff in any city if you are willing to look,” he says. “I found a pile of 12 pairs of shoes laying outside a 7-11 once. That was pretty strange because they were all different kinds of shoes, old and new, vintage converse, dusty work boots, shiny black patent leather ones all just sitting there.” 

Foster is not the only one who wanders. There is an online community that posts pictures of their adventures. The great thing about urban wandering and searching for abandoned places is that it’s typically guerilla and doesn’t suit linking to websites, but search for urban wandering, urban exploration, and yes, the phrase ‘abandoned porn,’ and you’ll find some results, but maybe don’t search that on your work computer. 

the_hidden_worlds_of_pvd was initially meant to be just like these guerilla sites for wandering, but Foster fully admits that it’s gotten more traction since his Pecha Kucha and was kind enough to allow me to talk to him while gushing about his work. 

The Instagram account is poetic, and breathtaking, but Foster finds that the world is different now, too. “This habit of mine has caused me to look at things differently, obviously. I now see trash and decay as beautiful and interesting, but I also find myself really looking at the light of the day. The fresh light of early morning or the soft glow in a late afternoon are spectacular in Providence; it has the ability to give everything a golden tone that has a magical quality about it. When you see the houses lit up on the East Side just as the sun is going down over the city it is no wonder Poe, Lovecraft, Chris Van Alsberg and even Shepard Fairey found inspiration here.” 

And while it may have started as a hobby and spread to a social media account, Foster encourages us all to do something that I think we’re out of touch with: fall in love with where we are, as we are. Find the beauty in the dirty parts of life, and above all, find a connection with where you are – no matter who you are – and never stop exploring.