Macy's Queens Center Unveils 3 Large Murals To Inspire Letter-Writing Campaign To Santa

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A local artist is using his talent to bring the magic of Christmas to children who are sick.

The decorations are going up at Macy's in the Queens Center Mall. Outside the store you'll find colorful murals that start with a letter written to Santa, and then a wall of wishes and dreams that leads to a beautiful music box and the word "believe."

The murals help kick-off Macy's Believe Campaign, where children write or email letters to Santa, CBS2's Cindy Hsu reported Wednesday.

For each letter written to Santa, Macy's is donating $1 to Make-A-Wish, which has added up so far to more than $25 million and over 16,000 wishes granted.

Artist Rey Rosa, known as "The Drif," grew up in and out of foster homes and battled a critical illness. At 10 years old, the Make-A-Wish Foundation granted his dream.

"They granted my wish to go to Disney World. They took me and my whole entire family and it allowed me to see that there was more outside than living in the Bronx in the projects. So I got to see all this color, all this creativity, all this magic happening," Rosa said.

He now shares that magic through his art. He came up with the idea for the Believe murals to encourage kids to keep dreaming, and enlisted seven other artists to help create them.

"It's awesome. This is bringing together. I mean, to think a Wish alum, a kid, who had his wish in 1999, is part of this," Make-A-Wish's Phil Lussier said.

"Just amazing. I heard Rey's story and when they said they were going to come here and actually paint the murals ... it's such an amazing story," added Danielle McKay of Macy's.

Rosa told Hsu he hopes the murals will encourage kids and the whole community to believe.

The Macy's Believe campaign runs through Christmas Eve.

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