When the government is not doing its job properly, artists and local urban enthusiasts can help. Artist Juliana Santacruz Herrera must have thought the same.

In Paris she started to repair the potholes in the streets with colorful yarn. Randomly placed in cracks and breaks, her designs result in a colourful addition to the urban lay-out. She draws inspiration from the recent guerrilla knitting trend adopted mostly by women in different cities around the world.

She uses the women’s creations to decorate urban objects like pillars, phone booths and bikes. This colourful addition to the streets of Paris must have been a lot of work for the artist, and it’s not particularly long lasting; however, it also draws attention to the local government’s failings in a constructive way, brightening up the day for thousands of people in a way that asphalt never could.

This and more inspiring projects can be found in A smart guide to Utopia.