What’s happening with the Boot & Saddle sign?

The Boot & Saddle sign will shine on. Even though the two-story-tall stainless steel structure shaped like a cowboy boot — that illuminates South Broad Street in shades of pink, blue and yellow — advertises a bar that no longer exists.

The space at 1131 S. Broad St. housed the Boot & Saddle, a South Philly watering hole once popular with country music fans and Navy Yard workers. It was home to an indie rock club from 2013 to 2020, until it became a casualty of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now, the former Boot has been reborn at Solar Myth, an all day jazz cafe and bar that also will present shows booked by the Ars Nova Workshop. The partners at Solar Myth — Mark Christman of Ars Nova Workshop and Evan Clancy of Fountain Porter — have wisely decided to maintain the folk art masterpiece that has become a South Philly landmark.

» READ MORE: Rebirth on Broad Street: How Boot & Saddle became Solar Myth

“We’re keeping it,” said Christman, standing in the shadow of the sign that was built in the 1950s by Angelo Colavita, who operated a sign shop at 15th and Alter Street. He also added that they’re working with the Preservation Alliance to get a historical marker for it.

He said that the venue might possibly add a Solar Myth neon sign in the bar’s facade — it’s now named only in a subtle stenciled sign that makes gives off the vibe of a speakeasy — but the Boot & Saddle sign and all its mid century neon folk and splendor are not going anywhere.“We are the stewards of it for the indefinite future. We will turn it on, every night,” Christman said.

When Boot & Saddle first reopened as a music club in 2013, the sign was non-functioning, but the group of music entrepreneurs pledged in an agreement with the South Broad Street Neighborhood Association to restore it to working order.

That took some time and was expensive, says Sean Agnew, the Boot co-owner who shut the club in 2020 but still co-owns Union Transfer and independent bookers, R5 Productions.

For the first years of the indie rock club, Colavita’s sign remained unlit, but in 2015 it was removed from the building and neon expert Len Davidson supervised its repair by sign maker Dominic Urbani of Urban Neon.

In January 2016, the sign was reinstalled. The cost, Agnew said, ran to $50,000.

It was turned off at the start of the pandemic, and then lit once again for one week in November 2020 before the Boot & Saddle closed for good. Since then, it had been dark until Solar Myth opened for business this fall.