WasteShed Brings Affordable Art Supplies — and a New Creative Hub — to Edgewater's Broadway
By Socialhood News · Edgewater ·
A nonprofit that has spent more than a decade making art supplies affordable and keeping materials out of landfills has arrived on Edgewater's Broadway corridor — and its new storefront comes with something it has never had before: a dedicated classroom.
WasteShed, the environmentally minded art supply resale organization, opened at 5200 N. Broadway after relocating from its longtime Evanston home, executive director Eleanor Ray told Block Club Chicago. The move was prompted by necessity — WasteShed had to leave the Evanston space it shared with Rebuilding Exchange — but it lands the nonprofit in one of Chicago's most culturally active neighborhoods, in a storefront that had sat vacant for some time before WasteShed took it over.
Founded in 2014 in Humboldt Park, where its headquarters still remain, WasteShed expanded to Evanston in 2021. The model is simple but genuinely useful: the nonprofit collects donated art and craft supplies — paints, brushes, paper, yarn, fabric, and more — and resells them at deeply reduced prices, making creative materials accessible to artists, educators, students, and anyone who wants to make something without paying full retail. The environmental logic is equally direct: materials that might otherwise be thrown away get a second life in the hands of people who will use them.
The Edgewater location at 5200 N. Broadway adds a dimension WasteShed didn't have in Evanston. The new storefront includes a dedicated classroom area, Ray said — a physical space for workshops, instructional programming, and community gatherings that the previous location simply couldn't accommodate. For a neighborhood that has spent 2026 filling its corridors with independent food and retail businesses, a nonprofit creative supply shop with its own classroom is a different kind of arrival: not a restaurant or a boutique, but an institution oriented around making and learning.
The address puts WasteShed in the heart of Broadway's emerging stretch, accessible from the Berwyn Red Line stop. The nonprofit joins a corridor that has seen significant independent business activity in 2026, and its presence adds a civic, mission-driven layer to a commercial strip that has otherwise been driven by food and retail. Artists, teachers, parents of young makers, and anyone stocking a studio on a budget now have a local destination for supplies — without the overhead of a big-box craft store.
Meanwhile, the Edgewater Branch Library at 6000 N. Broadway is rolling out a new Winter Well-Being Series, announced November 9, that extends the library's programming into the colder months. This Sunday, November 16, the library hosts two family-friendly events back to back: Baby Music with Miss Ruby at 10:30 a.m. and a Monday Matinee screening of the 2025 film The Long Walk at 2:00 p.m. in the Betty A. Barclay Community Room — both free and open to the public. And on Wednesday, November 18, Edgewater Village Chicago's Meditation for Stress Reduction and Better Sleep returns to the library at 1:00 p.m., part of the ongoing wellness programming the organization runs in partnership with the branch.
Also on November 18, Edgewater Village Chicago is hosting a Help Desk Session from 12:00 to 2:00 p.m. at Emanuel Congregation — a free, practical resource session for Edgewater residents navigating everything from benefits to housing questions.
Taken together, WasteShed's arrival on Broadway and the library's expanded winter calendar reflect something Edgewater does in every season: it fills its public and civic spaces with programming and institutions that serve residents at every stage of life. A nonprofit art supply shop with a classroom, a baby music program, a film screening, a meditation session, and a community help desk — none of these are splashy, but all of them are the kind of infrastructure that makes a neighborhood feel like a place worth belonging to.
WasteShed at 5200 N. Broadway is accessible from the Berwyn Red Line stop; visit wasteshed.org for hours and updates. For the Edgewater Branch Library's full November calendar, visit chipublib.org or stop in at 6000 N. Broadway. Edgewater Village Chicago's full programming schedule, including the Help Desk Session at Emanuel Congregation and the November 18 Meditation session, lives at evchicago.org.
Sources:
1. https://blockclubchicago.org/2026/09/28/wasteshed-an-art-supply-resale-nonprofit-is-moving-from-evanston-to-edgewater/
2. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/28/
3. https://www.evchicago.org/programs