In the cointinuing evolution of the “extra space” at the Art Garden, the idea of creative workshops just keep coming up stronger and stronger. I keep waffling over whether I want to teach “live” on top of all the online teaching. I have a lot of very talented friends who do want to teach live.

So, I started playing with the idea of a different kind of “art school”. One that only explored creativity through new media (transfers, Panpastels, Sheer Heaven, etc.) and taught no-fail workshops where you could create something beautiful whether you are an accomplished artist or haven’t even thought about making art since first grade. Even accomplished artists would find the new media interesting.

We needed a name that would go with The Art Garden and express the idea of budding and growing creativity. My dear friend Sue Kloess came up with this one and I LOVE it:

The byline will be “Cultivating Creativity”.

The space will be divided from the gallery space with open gridwall panels, so it will be more of a psychological division than a “wall”. We will hold small workshops right there in the gallery, and for larger workshops/retreats, we will use an awesome classroom that is right there in the complex.

I am chatting with my good friend, Richard Salley about a jewelry workshop in mid January. Stay tuned and you will be the first to know!

I have another good friend wo works at Home Depot. Mark and I went in there looking for something like a counter for a coffeemaker. By the time we got done with possibilities, we decided on these 9 foot wall units – two of them. They are oak with a granite looking countertop. One will be for the Greenhouse section and one for the coffee bar in the gallery. We even fit a little refrigerator under that one.

It was amazing how my friend, Mary Gail, was able to mock up these counters on her Home Depot computer and show us exactly where they would go and how  much room they would take. I wish I could find those printouts to show you a comparison – maybe later.

But we put the real things together on Thanksgiving day and here is the coffee bar unit.

That is a toe-kick in the front which has to be cut and placed on either side of the refirgerator. In the Greenhouse unit, the two middle sections are 36″ wide each giving us nice big drawers and cabinets for storage. One of the resaons we did this is that the gallery space had *no* storage. These units will give us quite a bit.

And finally, here’s a funny, serendipitous story. Mark and I and Sue Kloess went to an art show on Friday. When you come in, they give you a raffle ticket to fill out. If you win a drawing, you choose from art donated by all the exibitors. Sue and I are jaded and just started to walk away. Mark said “Hey, what about these?” (He hasn’t gone to many shows with us because he was always working, you see.)

“Oh, we never do those,” Sue and I said in unison.

“Well, then, you’ll never win.”

That made sense, so Sue filled hers out. I left ours to Mark.

We had not gone down one half of an aisle before they called Mark’s name over the PA system. He won!

We got to pick from three tables full of wonderful artwork. Right off the bat, Mark liked this painting:

Gee – I wonder why? One more dog than we have, but the resemblance is there. I loved the title too:

“2 Dogs, 4 Dogs, Rescue More Dogs”

It is an original painting done on paper clay!

We had to go find the artist, Jill Flinn, and oh what a wonderful person. She paints to support the animal rescue she runs at her home in Wisconsin.

We loved her work and bought four more paintings for the gallery.

We all talked about how it must have been meant to be.

That’s all for the moment . . .

Here’s what I have been talking about all this time – what I went to Texas for. These are seven feet tall and so interesting. We will have four of them in the gallery, and one four foot version. We will be hanging pretty things from them – everything from the wonderful handmade birdhouses by my friend Diane Moreno (remember visiting her house with me?) to the cutest fused glass birds in the world.

I can’t wait to see this come together – as it has to do by our grand opening on December 12, but this is the stage where you look at it, and think it’s never going to happen. The time when you have to have a lot of faith in your imagination and vision.

The gallery looks like this right now:

The wall is done and the gallery is painted (thanks to Mark). We used my “secret formula” offwhite color on the walls – which I have used in every gallery space we have had in the past – and even a couple of houses. It is a neutral white with an almost green feel to it. Putting it on any walls makes for instant elegance. People are already stopping by and saying the space looks great – even with that big pile of insulation there!

The insulation came from the ceiling and will go back up there when the fire inspector inspects the new wall (today we hope). Mark is installing oak baseboard today and we expect delivery of some huge cabinet configurations we ordered from Home Depot. When they are in place, we can beging to make this space happen.

A lot to do in two weeks, but I just keep thinking “Yes, we can.”

Your 43 Comments with suggestions of how to outfit a Card Art Table were so helpful! Thank you all!

The Winners of the Ten Packs of Sheer Heaven are:

Comment# 19 – Lisa

Comment# 38 – Alice in Denver

Ladies, please send your snail mail addresses to:

jessica@wisdomwoman.com

Thanks again to everyone who participated.

This place takes up a whole city block in Fredericksburg. It has more unusual stuff than I have ever seen anywhere. My garden is enhanced by many things I got here on past visits, and it is my destination for metal trees and such. She who enters here will exit much lightened in the pocketbook, I warn you. I would love to show you what I bought, but I have to get home to do that. I did not want things strapped to the top of the van, so we got everything in the back – but we will probably never get it out. There are lots of entwined branches and such. When I told my sister about it, she said it is like a giant metal tumbleweed. And so it is. Mark likes puzzles, so this will be a good one to entertain him with!

In my previous post, you could see some interesting, twiggy things standing around. They are the first of my metal vegetation, which will play a large role in the decor of the Art Garden.

Two years ago, on a trip to Texas, I bought a 7 foot metal tree sculpture for my garden. It looks for all the world like a real tree with no leaves (like in Winter). In fact, people don’t even notice that it is not a real tree.

So, when I first envisioned how the new gallery will look, I saw some of these trees standing around.

Because they came from Mexico, I thought that I could find some on my recent trip to Southern Arizona. Vesta and I looked everywhere. Then, as fate would have it, Vesta set up her booth at an Art Show that weekend, and the lady in the next booth had a metal tree. But it was huge and would not fit in my van. She also had this trellis, though, and I thought it would make a good substitute.

I plan to stand it in a large pot that will be planted with flowers. It’s about 7 feet tall. The artist is really nice and was willing to make me two smaller trees as well –  like this . . .

These will be used to display jewelry and other small items.

The reason for my current Texas trip is to secure more trees. I took the seats out of the van and was able to get three of them in there – 7 footers – along with some metal twig trellises and other stuff. They all fit. I am only worried that when I get home, we will not be able to untangle them to get them out of the van and into the gallery!

I was so busy getting ready to leave on Thursday, but a friend from Denver was in town with her daughter, so I grabbed some time for lunch, and then took them across the street to see the gallery space . . . and, Woo-Hoo, my wall was being built.

I had told my landlord that my “imaginator” had reached its limit. I could no longer “picture things” with that big opening there. He will have his own computer business on the other side of that wall. so he was eager too.

Here’s the long view of how the wall affects the space . . .

Today is Sunday, and by now, the wall is done enough that Mark can start to paint.

I chose an off white that a has a very neutral (almost greenish) tone to it (garden). Hopefully, when I get back mid-week, we can actually begin to set up the infrastructure!

The past week of gallery activity has been about signing leases, getting new phone lines, measuring for paint, buying paint, waiting for our dividing wall to be permitted and built – you get the idea. Not the romantic, exciting part. I told the landlord that I was at the limit of my ability to visualize without having that wall up. He said he will hurry.

So, meanwhile, I thought I would start to share a little of what I will put in the gallery because you will be shopping with us too! And inquiring minds want to know – right?

Because I have purchased these tiles myself, and because whenever I have seen them in a gallery, they are almost sold out already, this was the first artist I contacted to get his work for the Art Garden.

His Name is Michael Cohen and these tiles are so wonderful! They are 6″x6″ approximately, and all of them are this beautiful cobalt blue and the glaze has a velvety matte finish. The debossed center where the designs are is a crystallized glaze that looks like melted marbles. That makes sense because the effect is actually made by melting a hunk of glass in that indentation.

And the designs, of course, are just the kind of designs we like.

Here is a close up of the look of the center section . . .

We will start out carrying twelve designs – ones I have specially chosen to harmonize with the Art Garden environment.

I have created the first Art Garden Shopping Page for our online audience. Although I am not supposed to sell anything before our opening on December 12 (so there will be something left in the gallery when it opens!), I know that these tiles make wonderful gifts, and with shipping in the mix, waiting to let you order until December 12 would make a crunch.

So, here is what I have decided to do. I have set up the Shopping Cart for you to order. In about a week, I will gather the orders and submit them to the artist. I’m sure he will get them here by early December and we can ship to you as soon as they get here. After next Tuesday, I can’t guarantee we could get them in time, so if you want them, order soon. They make a wonderful gift because even one is a “statement” hanging on the wall.

The tiles have both a hanger indentation in the back and little pads so they can be a trivet. They are heavy, so we will ship by Flat Rate Priority Mail ($11). A single tile will make it for the 1 lb and under rate of $5.50.

Here are the styles:

Art Garden Blue Tiles Page

I love these, but have given all mine away as gifts. I’ll have to fix that situation right quick!

Fountains play a HUGE part in my life.

I know they bring good energy and prosperity and all, but the thing is, the sound of running water soothes my soul.

It was for this reason I invented the very first portable desktop fountin in the early 90’s.

Fountains keep me sane (sort of).

This fountain has been a part of my garden for about seven years now, and the day I set it up each year, is the first day of Summer for me.

So when I built the garden room, it was the first thing I had to have to bring the feeling of my real garden into the inside space.

Here is the one I set up in the garden room.

Here’s a close-up of my wonderful flower rock I got in Texas. I hope to get some of these for the gallery. I love this photo.

Teddy finds the garden room fountain very soothing too.

So, of course, one of the first things I have to put in the new “Art Garden” is a fountain. I found my ceramic supplier out at the Santa Fe Flea Market just before she went back to Mexico for the Winter and told her I needed another fountain. But I was a little worried – see the wet drops on the floor around Teddy? My fountains spit – and in the gallery, with carpeting, that would not be good.

She came up with this one – which is perfect! The bowl is deep enough to be sure that we won’t have any spitting on our carpet. I know this looks like a goblet, but it is actually about three and a half feet tall. All I need are the rocks and pump – and some water, of course.

And among the pottery was this wonderful rusted metal table. Since there was an end-of-season 50% off sale going on, we got that too. . .

I am also starting to gather some of the art that will be featured at The Art Garden and I will give you a sneak peak (but nobody can shop until December 12 because that is when we open both online and in the brick-and-mortar space).

This photo explains a bit more what this complex is like and I will take a better photo today from a better vantage point.

There are two large building with interior halls (and restrooms). The first building on the left here is ours and you are looking at the space from the opposite direction from yesterday. That is the second entrance and door. There will be paved parking along this sidewalk. That is a huge planter at the end of the sidewalk, which will be beautiful in Summer.  The building in the distance is a twin to this one and what looks like a tiny house down there is a large restaurant. All is new construction and most has never been occupied.

To answer Carol’s question yesterday, putting the wall in front of the window did leave a too small and awkward space. When you walk in a door and the space is wider than it is deep, you get an energy that pushes you back out – and we don’t want that. The energy of this space is at the top of my priority list.

The landlord is energetic and dynamic and always thinking of new solutions. We were talking about something or other yesterday, and I told him Mark and I had tried to think of every way to rationalize taking that extra space and couldn’t, because of the extra cost.

So, he offered to let us take it on at no extra cost for a few months to see if we could make it work for us. My poor brain!! Back to thinking some more. But that decision is a no-brainer.

So, this is the extra space we now have added (approx 500 sq ft) . . . and we need to figure out what to do with it.

Mixing gallery and art-making space is very very tricky and the combination usually does not work – unless it is one artist working in their own gallery space. And this is not that. We will have the work of many artists, and I have plenty of places to work already, thank you anyway!!

But I had been planning all along to sneak a little art-making in and sort of camouflage it.

My plan is to have a lot of greeting cards because this community has no place to get a card besides the grocery store. So, I thought, if among the card racks, I had one with packaged card blanks of all varieties, and a table full of art supplies, customers could buy some card blanks for like $2.50ea and spend as much time as they wanted hanging out and making their own cards. Everybody I mentioned it to seemed to love this idea.

Since we had just recently taken a great big oak dining table to the dump when we bought a new one (see, you should *never* throw anything away!), I went searching on Craig’s list and found this great table for $50!

And it had a leaf to add to make it bigger . . .

My idea is to have a double lazy susan in the center which will hold the art supplies like some stamps and ink etc. This is for the bottom of the lazy susan, so there will still be working room on either side of the table. I think this will look good.

I found this precut round at Lowes and a smaller one too – plus the hardware to make them into lazy susans. They will be sanded and stained to match the table.

I was going to have my cards racks and the table here near the front right corner, but now with the extra space, I am thinking to maybe use my revolving card racks to make a sort of division between the gallery and the extra space and have the art-making area back there – where, yes, I could also do workshops.

I need your help to outfit this table with basic card making supplies that non-artists would understand and feel comfortable playing with – even if they never made cards before.

We will have multi-colored card blanks and envelopes for them to work with. They buy them. We will have scrap paper to practice on. The lazy susan will not hold everything in the world, obviously, so if you had to outfit it, what would you have sitting there?

I am willing to offer Ten Packs of Sheer Heaven to two of you for helping me think this part through. We will choose from the comments by a drawing. So, what do you suggest?

Whether you are buying a new house or starting a new adventure, it is an exciting thing to get the keys in your hands. It makes it all real.

Especially in the case of a gallery space, you can now be a part of the space and start to visualize what you might be able to do there.

So, lets go inside an take a look . . .

Through this door, and here is what you see . . .

This space is 28.5′ wide and 50′ deep. The thing in the lower left corner of the photo is a table cloth on somebody’s folding table that was left in there for some reason.

If you walk to that far back wall and look back, you see this . . .

The space is actually L-shaped and goes off to the left from where you are standing in this photo. But we never considered including that because it is just too much space for us (and too much money).

So our decision is about how much of this 1500 sq ft you are looking at we should commit to and have a wall built to shut us off from the rest. We have this measured off in this picture. Where the chair is sitting indicates 35′ in from the door. If the wall were put there, we would have 1000 sq ft of gallery space.

But the question then becomes how to divide the second window.

Here, we are standing over in that extra area from the L-Shape. This area, between the chair and the back wall is another 484 sq ft – and it adds another door to the space. If we put our wall in where the chair is, it would hit the window where the red arrow is pointing which is a weird place to divide the window.

If we were rich or something, we would just take the whole thing – but we are not, so this decision is a big one.

And if we did take the whole space, could we fill it adequately?

After a lot of thinking, Mark and I decide to stay with the 1000 sq ft and figure out how to make the wall/window junction look less strange.