Urban Green Lab is unveiling the fifth mural in its Waste Less series today at Turnip Truck East, 701 Woodland St., as part of a Harvest Fest running from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. The event pairs the mural launch with a chili cook-off, a cookbook swap and a food drive, turning a public art unveiling into a full-on neighborhood gathering focused on cutting food waste.
The festival, organized by Urban Green Lab in partnership with Turnip Truck East, centers on the unveiling of local artist Acacia Barron's mural, according to the organization's event listing. Barron's design carries the theme “Food is what brings us together,” a message Urban Green Lab says anchors this year's installment of its Waste Less mural project. Nashville outlet abcnashville.org reported that Barron was selected to bring the Waste Less Mural Project to Turnip Truck's East location with a design celebrating food and community, and that the piece was set to debut at the Harvest Festival.
Per the open call for the project, this year's mural was required to include the phrase “Food is What Brings Us Together. Waste Less.,” according to the submission listing posted on app.entrythingy.com. Urban Green Lab describes itself as Nashville's hub for sustainability education, community and local advocacy, and the mural series is one of its more visible public-facing efforts. The group says on its murals page that the Waste Less campaign, developed in partnership with NRDC, has grown into a national effort to educate the public about reducing food waste.
Chili, Cookbooks and a Food Drive Round Out the Day
Beyond the mural reveal, the Harvest Fest includes an East Nashville neighborhood chili cook-off, with judging handled by East Nashville Food System Champions, and live music is also on the schedule, according to the event listing from Nashville Lifestyles. The day's lineup also features a Nashville Public Library cookbook swap and pumpkin painting, giving families a reason to linger beyond the ribbon-cutting for the new artwork. A food drive benefiting The Store is part of the festival as well, according to Urban Green Lab's event page.
One Mural in a Growing Citywide Series
This is not Urban Green Lab's first mural tied to food waste. The organization's murals page notes that in 2025, it partnered with NRDC and the Tennessee Arts Commission to install a mural at the Nashville Farmers' Market, created by North Nashville muralist and mixed-media artist Jamal “Jay” Jenkins, known artistically as Woke3. Earlier installations include a mural at the Turnip Truck on Charlotte Avenue highlighting how food builds community, two window murals at the Patagonia Nashville store promoting food as fuel, and a mural on the Bandywood Drive side of the Kroger in Green Hills, done in partnership with Kroger and the Alliance for Green Hills.
The mural campaign sits inside a broader municipal push to cut down on what Nashville sends to landfills. More than 80 percent of Davidson County's waste currently ends up in landfills, according to Metro figures cited by the Nashville Scene. The city's 2019 Zero Waste initiative calls for diverting 90 percent of Nashville's waste from landfills, the outlet reported, and Compost Nashville says it has diverted more than 10 million pounds of waste since 2014 through its composting programs.
Food Scraps Make Up a Big Share of the Problem
Nearly a third of all waste that winds up at landfills in Middle Tennessee consists of food scraps and other organic materials that could be composted, according to a report from WKRN. Metro Nashville has adopted a community-wide target of reducing food waste by 50 percent by 2030, the station reported, and the Metro Council adopted the broader Zero Waste goal in August 2021. Collected scraps from Compost Nashville's program are taken to a facility in Ashland City to be turned into nutrient-rich soils for farmers, landscapers and gardeners, per the same report.
Interest in Metro's composting efforts has outpaced capacity. More than 3,000 people applied for 750 spots in Metro Nashville's residential composting pilot program, the Nashville Scene reported, while WKRN separately reported that over 1,200 applications had been submitted for the same pilot, which is limited to 750 participating households. Against that backdrop, today's mural launch offers a smaller, street-level entry point into the city's food-waste conversation — one built around chili, cookbooks and a fresh coat of paint on Woodland Street.
