How one 14-year-old is helping her younger brother travel the world through chalk

Everett said the chalk art was inspired by all the places she and her younger brother, who have never travelled outside of the US, want to visit

Macaire Everett said the chalk art was inspired by all the places she and her younger brother want to go. Macaire's Muse/Instagram 

While the coronavirus pandemic has brought numerous travel plans and adventures to a standstill, it hasn’t stopped Macaire Everett, 14, from helping her younger brother see the world.

Everett has spent the past few months recreating global landmarks with chalk on the driveway of her home in Libertyville, Illinois, creating postcard-perfect scenes for her little brother to step into.

In one of Everett’s sidewalk chalk drawings, Camden, 9 – wearing a striped shirt with a red kerchief tied around his neck – is seen on a gondola, steering the chalk-drawn vessel through the winding canals of Venice.

Another one of Everett’s creations shows the Leaning Tower of Pisa, as her brother adopts the classic tourist pose, trying to push the tilted structure upright.

During an interview with Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest on the pair's TV show Live with Kelly and Ryan, the siblings explained how the concept for the chalk art came to be.

“It was pretty much out of boredom,” Everett said. “We really didn’t have anything to do and this started during spring break, when we couldn’t travel. We were really bummed out about that. So we went outside, grabbed some chalk and started doing chalk art and posting them [online].”

After some encouragement from friends and neighbours, Everett set a goal to create a new chalk art every day for 100 days. She said neither her or her younger brother have ever travelled outside of the US and the chalk art was inspired by “all the places we want to go”.

Though 100 days have now passed since the two began their chalk art adventures, the siblings are continuing the project after being encouraged by their growing Instagram following.

“Now we’re getting all these requests from people, talking about how they want us to visit their country through the chalk because no one else can travel either,” she said.

Everett has created more than 120 chalk landscapes, taking her and Camden everywhere from the Great Wall of China to the Pyramids of Giza. In one of the chalk scenes, Camden poses next to the Moai at Easter Island with his toy bunny. In another, he is driving a jet ski in Toronto.

Yet, his favourite, he told Seacrest and Ripa, sees him swap the role of tourist for action hero in a Mission Impossible-inspired scene where he dangles from the edge of a cliff as he tries to reach a helicopter to escape.

The pictures of the chalk art, Everett said, are all taken by her father, who manages to capture a bird's eye view of the scenes with the help of a drone.

“He’s also in charge of power-washing the driveway after every single art,” Everett said.

In case of rain, the siblings take their project to the basement of their house.

“My dad prepared a space,” Everett said. “It’s just a concrete floor in his workshop where I can work when it rains. We then take a picture using the ladder inside.”

Everett said she isn’t sure where her artistic sensibility came from as no one in her family is an artist. She started out “with some really simple drawings," she said. "But looking back, if you do something for 100 days, you really improve and learn."