What is the Butterfly Festival?

Amazing, aluminum sculpture butterflies have been created by student and local artists for display at companies, churches and private homes in our community. The Butterfly Festival was first conceived in 2017 to boost available scholarship funds and to showcase the talents of budding student artists while beautifying the community. According to Robert Westheimer, Newspring’s founder, “We’ve been thrilled to see the community engagement driven by this initiative and excited that butterflies are finding homes in places where we hope they inspire and engage.”

The butterflies measure 5’ wide x 3.25’ deep x 4.75’ tall. Proceeds raised from the sale of butterflies now benefit the Visual Arts Program, providing free art classes to underserved students. The classes help fuel the minds of young students and provide a safe, nurturing and inclusive environment for them to be creative and thrive.

Houston Arboretum & Nature Center Butterfly

This beautiful monarch butterfly has landed at the Houston Arboretum & Nature Center! Gifted to Debbie Markey by Forney Construction, and Garza Site Development, and painted by NewSpring student artist Daniela Cruz.

David Weekley Homes

Natividad Mosqueda, a graduate of NewSpring’s art program and scholarship recipient, designed this whimsical butterfly. Thanks to David Weekley Homes, NewSpring awarded five additional college scholarships totaling $12,500 in the fall of 2017.  These were awarded to the creators of the five top designs for the Butterfly Festival.  Winners included Adrianna Guillen, Natividad Mosqueda, Chinh Pham, Joel Gonzalez and Sandra Melgar.

Club Westside

Linda McIngvale, Club Westside’s owner, commissioned the Newspring butterfly for the beautiful grounds of the club. In the middle of a redesign of the Club including a putt-putt golf course and official monarch garden, Linda envisioned a giant monarch to attract the smaller, real ones. Known for its beautiful landscaping and exotic wildlife, in addition to the world-class fitness and tennis facility, the lush gardens of Club Westside are the perfect setting for Dani’s uniquely designed monarch butterfly.

Daniela Cruz, a 2018 Northbrook High School graduate and Newspring college scholarship recipient, designed and created the giant monarch butterfly. She is a 3 rd year student at Houston Community College, majoring in Elementary Education.

Midway Butterflies

Purchased by Midway, these butterflies were chosen to promote and help students in Spring Branch. The cityscape design was created by a student at St. Mark Lutheran Church, titled ‘City Scape’ and painted by their art class. One of our alumni designed and painted the pepper-filled butterfly. Landrum Middle School collaboratively painted the flower and monarch butterfly. See them at City Center, where you can enjoy them while you shop!

RaiseUp Families

The Friends of RaiseUp Families (formally, Westside Homeless Prevention) purchased a Newspring butterfly through WHP to support both the students of Newspring and the families of WHP. It has been placed at Memorial Green with the cooperation of the Midway Company and Catherine Sdao between Jonathan’s The Rub and Dish Society as part of the 2018 Butterfly Festival.

St. Philip Presbyterian Church

A beautiful butterfly incorporating many cherished symbols of the parish sits in the east lawn of the church. The butterfly was gifted by several church families.