Interesting Places to Explore in Peoria: A Jail House, a Theater-Turned-Firehouse and Art by the Road

Most Peorians know the freeways, the shopping centers and the sports complex. Fewer have spent an hour walking the few blocks where the town began, or stopped to look at the artwork beside the roads they drive every day. The places below are worth that second look. Most are free and outdoors; a couple are ticketed. Where a building can only be seen from the outside, we say so.

Osuna Park and the 1939 Jail House

Start downtown at Osuna Park on 83rd Avenue, the city's oldest park, which dates to the early 1900s. It is easy to treat as a pass-through, but look closer. Harmony Park, a free outdoor set of musical bells, tubes and a xylophone, invites anyone to play. Kevin Berry's sculpture Back on Track, installed by the Peoria Arts Commission in 2013, and the park's tile mosaics add art to the walk, and the restroom building is styled like an old railroad depot, a nod to Peoria's days as a stop on the Santa Fe line. The site of the town's 1889 well is in the park too.

Next to the park stands the Peoria Jail House, a two-room building the Works Progress Administration put up in 1939, when the town had fewer than 2,000 residents. It served as jail and police station into the 1960s, then as Peoria Town Hall, where the City Council met until a new City Hall opened in 1991. Today it is preserved on Washington Street between the park and the Peoria Center for the Performing Arts.

The historic square and a theater that became a firehouse

A block or two away, Peoria Central School is the oldest standing schoolhouse in the Peoria School District. The two-room Mission Revival building, with its clay tile roof and curved parapet, opened in 1906, grew with more classrooms and an auditorium, and was used for some 70 years. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. The museum that once operated inside closed when the Peoria Arizona Historical Society dissolved in 2019, and in April 2026 the city began restoring the building as an arts and cultural center. Until it reopens, expect construction fencing and view it from the street. Nearby are the Peoria Presbyterian Church of 1899 and the Peoria Women's Club of 1919.

On Washington Street, the old Fire Station No. 1 has one of downtown's more surprising histories. It was built in 1920 as the Paramount Theater, later renamed the Peoria Theater, and became the city's fire station in 1954, serving for 52 years. It housed a craft distillery for a few years and is now the Fire House Event Center, a venue for weddings, parties and community pop-ups that gives tours by appointment.

The city's historic preservation pages offer two self-guided walking tours, one for the Old Town commercial blocks and one around 83rd Avenue and Madison Street, that pull these buildings together.

Art you can walk into

Behind The Monastery AZ gallery at 8301 W. Washington Street, the Peoria Mural Garden turns a once-empty lot into an outdoor gallery of murals by local and regional artists. It is free and open through the month, and during 2nd Saturdays artists paint there live, so the walls change over the season. The Monastery itself, which opened in March 2025, is open to visitors on weekends with rotating exhibitions.

For a coffee between stops, Driftwood Coffee is on Jefferson Street, and Caldwell County BBQ, which opened in spring 2026, is on Washington Street in the same blocks.

Public art beside the road

Peoria sets aside one percent of the cost of city construction projects, from streets to fire stations, for public art, and the results are scattered across town. The most visible is Forge, a large work by Thomas Sayre at Pioneer Community Park that can be seen from 83rd Avenue near Olive. Downtown, Emanuel Martinez's Pioneer Memorial is one of the pieces on the city's self-guided public art tour, which comes as a downloadable brochure along with an interactive map of the collection.

At Rio Vista Community Park on Thunderbird Road, the Veterans Memorial recognizes those who have served and are serving. Its Honor Wall grows every year as new names are added at the city's Veterans Day ceremony.

Two ticketed stops

The Peoria Center for the Performing Arts, downtown on 83rd Drive, stands on the site of the old city hall. The city-owned building has a 274-seat main stage and a 60-seat black box theater, is run by the nonprofit TheaterWorks, and marks its 20th anniversary this season. Seeing a show, or the city's free Global Sounds concerts in 2027, is the best way inside.

At Peoria's northern edge, Lake Pleasant Regional Park became part of the city in 1996, though Maricopa County runs it and charges a day-use entry fee. The lake is a reservoir on the Central Arizona Project system, and Visit Peoria notes that the balcony at the park's nature center, which the county lists as the Discovery Center, gives a wide view of the water and a close look at Waddell Dam. If you're driving up Lake Pleasant Parkway, Fabio On Fire's Pizzeria Italiana makes a dinner stop on the way home.

Plan your visit

Osuna Park, the Mural Garden and the public art are free and outdoors; the historic schoolhouse, church and jail are viewed from outside. Check The Monastery's and TheaterWorks' own pages for current hours and shows, and the county's alerts before driving to Lake Pleasant. Downtown is compact enough to see in a morning on foot, which is the best way to notice what you've been driving past.