Art Smart Academy

Love the classes and enjoyed this so much bought more classes. Came back with kids. I bought the kids a few pieces of pottery and we painted them there, they fired them and had them ready in less than a week. The kids are now hooked and love making art. Need a date night or even a ladies night out? Try this place! Great Sunday afternoon family activity.

I went to a painting class here in January 2015, shortly after they moved into this new space. Me and my friend were explained that we could only use certain colors and only 2 brushes or we would be charged extra. The owner was rushing around like a madwoman and there were only 4 or 5 of us in there for this paint class. We heard her being rude to someone who walked in off the street and she told another lady in the paint class that she «should keep her day job» instead of going into painting! The owner (Cathy? catherine?) kept interrupting the class to take care of other people and stuff and so we were not through with our paintings when the class time was up but were told we had to take them with us anyway. All in all, not a good experience.

Buyer beware! Apparently their no refunds policy applies even when the Academy cancels the session. On a recent visit with my daughter, who lives in the Columbia area, I booked a class for us to do together, a mother-​daughter outing. Unfortunately, two hours before the Friday night class (and 2 hours after I spoke to Katherine by phone) I received a call from the studio saying that because we were the only two people scheduled the class would be canceled. I explained to Katherine (on at least 3 occasions since then) that I would be returning to NJ in a few days and so could not «make-​up» the class on a later date. Apparently holding a class for «just» 2 people is not cost-​effective, but really! If you are comfortable with taking the class when it’s convenient for the studio regardless of the date you choose, then go forth and enjoy your art experience. Unfortunately I have to give the studio no stars, since I got no such experience for my money. The Unilocal page requires the stars field not be left empty, hence the one star rating.

I love this place! I did the paint a long class here, and it was just awesome! I’ve never taken a painting class before. So, I’m going in totally blind. The first one I did was a tree. It looked VERY daunting. Two hours later, my piece surprisingly came out pretty nice!
And, I liked it so much that I did it again! I went back to do a lighthouse. I believe the instructor’s name on this one was Karen for the lighthouse. That was a tough piece. Karen took a lot of time with us. It was a two hour class, and I had no idea that it had already been three hours! She was so nice. In the end, I was also pretty satisfied with my lighthouse. :)
Participants made an evening out of the class, too. Groups went together, and on the lighthouse class, I went on a Saturday night, several people brought wine and snacks. Lots of fun!
The two pieces I did made for very nice Christmas presents I gave them to a good friend with whom I did a fall trip with that had the trees with the red autumn leaves and lighthouses. She loved them!
I can honestly say that I am hooked! I am definitely planning to go back. There is another lighthouse piece that I’m wanting to do when they feature it.