Seen through the eyes of local school children, the San Diego-Coronado Bridge could be green, or checkered. It could be drenched in night-time black, or sunrise red. And it might have pinwheel clouds above and curlicue waves below.

Art teachers at Coronado High School, Village Elementary and Strand Elementary schools were challenged with integrating a civic anniversary into a spring art curriculum and the teachers —and their students—rose to the task.

Lissy Rooney and Laura Bradford, art teachers at Coronado Village Elementary and Silver Strand Elementary respectively said the project gave their students a special reason, a tie-in to the anniversary of a local icon, to get excited about art.

Bradford had her students create collages of the bridge in the style of Eric Carle, author/illustrator of children’s classics like The Very Hungry Caterpillar. The collage-making process had two steps: first her fourth grade art students painted regular paper in a variety of colors, and then fifth grade art students used the painted paper to create collages of the bridge.

Fifth grade artist Savannah Welch took her time choosing the paper she would use. “You can’t pick any color and put it in a painting,” Welch explained. Besides picking her paper, the most difficult part of the project for Welch was cutting out the tiny Hotel Del Coronado in her picture. Welch decided to include the hotel because “the Hotel Del stands out from the bridge when you’re on it and a lot of people come across the bridge to see the Del and shop there.”

The art pieces of Village Elementary fourth graders all included one special detail in their Van Gogh-inspired drawings: Diego, the grey whale who appeared in the bay this spring. Art teacher Rooney said Diego helped her students connect to the project because it was an event that happened in their lifetime.

For Coronado High art students, participating in the anniversary was optional. “I thought I’d get maybe a couple of takers” said art teacher Laura Hill. “But I was proven wrong and I love it when my students surprise me like this! Over a third of the class happily took on the project.”

For some of the older students, their artwork cast the familiar landmark in a new light. Coronado High senior Melissa Humphrey said the process of painting the bridge gave her a new appreciation for the span that connects Coronado to mainland San Diego. “When I’m driving I just see it and it’s ‘Oh, there’s the bridge,’” Humphrey said. “But when I was doing this project I realized it’s just, like, so beautiful—and I don’t always appreciate that.”