About Dick and Jane’s Spot
At the corner of First and Pearl in Ellensburg, an ordinary house has spent decades disappearing beneath art. Dick and Jane’s Spot is a constantly evolving yard and exterior environment filled with reflectors, bottle caps, bicycle wheels, mosaics, carved figures, whirligigs, found objects, painted surfaces, and work by dozens of artists.
Artists Dick Elliott and Jane Orleman began developing the property after buying the house in 1978. What started with modest yard decoration expanded until fences, posts, walls, trees, and open spaces became surfaces for art. Elliott became especially known for work using retroreflectors that flare brilliantly when they catch light.
The numbers help explain the visual overload. Museum and archival sources describe more than 10,000 bottle caps, thousands of reflectors, and work by more than forty Pacific Northwest artists incorporated around the property.
Dick and Jane’s Spot remains a private residence, not a walk-through attraction. Visitors are welcome to view the art from outside the fence and around the perimeter but should not enter private areas. That boundary does little to reduce the spectacle. Nearly every direction from the sidewalk contains another spinning, shining, painted, nailed, or recycled object.