Family Workshops & events
Past Events
Montpelier’s Family Craft Night: A Partnership with Notion
$65 and up
Kids ages 5+ and their grownups are invited to an evening of creativity for all ages! Families will gather at Notion Fabric & Craft, where staff from Wilder Arts Studio will meet kids and walk them to the new studio at 7 Main Street to enjoy a craft project, pizza, and a movie.
Caregivers will stay at Notion for an informal craft circle with hors d'oeuvres and time to connect with other adults. Families will come together at the end to share cupcakes and see what everyone has made!
Children will join us at Wilder Arts for a night of needle felting, a pizza party, and movie screening! Children will all learn how to make a small felted “painting,” using our collection of upcycled wool roving, fleece, foam, and embroidery hoops. We will then dig into cheese and pepperoni pizzas while we all settle in for a movie. Once the movie is over, it’ll be time for adults to return to pick up their kids, celebrate their creations, and have a cupcake party!
Friday, June 7, 2024 | 5:45-8pm
Learn the art of leatherworking in this family workshop!
Leather artist Stace Fulwiler will show families how to cut custom pieces of leather to fit their wrists, then use leather stamps to customize the leather wrap bracelets with their names, nicknames, pictures, or even a special phrase. We will have many colors of leather to choose from, and scraps of colorful leather and shearling that can also be used to add even more detail to your bracelet.
Stace will show families how to finish their bracelets with snaps, making an accessory that you can wear for years to come! Each family member is gauranteed to go home with something that refelcts their own individual creativity and style.
Sunday, June 9, 2024 | 2-4pm
Do you have a collection of stuffies that could use some fixing up? Bring your beloved stuffies to our Teddy Bear Clinic for some TLC! We will help you sew those tails back on, patch up ripped seams or missing ears, and reattach eyeballs.
Bring your favorite stuffed animal or doll to this workshop, and our team of Stuffed Animal Veterinarians (or, you know, sewers) will help your family fix their favorite friends and get accessorized too!
This workshop will also feature Kellie Maas of Coastal Coping, who will have a variety of real medical tools on hand for kids to explore, play with, and test out on their stuffies. Kellie helps “take the scare out of medical care.” Through play, children will familiarize themselves with common medical tools used in child wellness exams, helping children become more comfortable with their own health and wellness experiences.
Children will also have the option of writing notes of encouragement and support to their stuffies, as they undergo their own treatment, and can tuck those notes into their stuffies before sewing and fixing them back up. The fixed-up stuffies can become a source of emotional support for kids apprehensive about going to the doctor or getting their shots.
Saturday, June 15, 2024 | 2-4pm
$40 per family
Come craft with your kids!
Paper sculpting is the art of taking something 2-dimensional and turning it into a 3-dimensional sculpture. In this class, families will work together to make their own container gardens out of paper! We’ll be using colored paper and colored pencils to create cacti, succulents, flowers, air plants, and pots. Through each plant, families will learn a variety of 3D paper sculpting techniques.
Paper artist and graphic designer Marisa Green will teach adults and children basic paper craft techniques and guide them in creating their paper plants and pots. Students will learn fundamentals like cutting, folding, and scoring, layering graduated paper shapes, curling, creating structure, and other methods. (Some precut shapes will be available for the youngest kids.) Whether true to life or fantastical, these colorful botanical displays will cheer up any room in your home.
Each family will go home with their paper planter to help welcome the beginning of Spring. This workshop is geared towards children ages 5+.
Saturday, April 6, 2024 | 1:30pm to 4pm
past events
$40 per family
Come experience a taste of the Scandinavian holidays!
Children and families will take part in a traditional Danish winter project, making woodland candle holders out of clay, dried flowers, pine cones, branches, nuts, cloves, and clay. We’ll have music playing, Scandinavian cardamom-cinnamon rolls for snacking, as well as our take on glogg for kids, a warm spiced cider. This is by far our most hygge family event!
Each child will go home with their candle holders, to be enjoyed at your holidays tables all winter long. This event is geared towards children ages 2-10 years old.
The studio is walkable to downtown Montpelier, and street parking is available.
Saturday, November 12, 2022 | 2:00pm to 4:00pm
sold out
Join us for our first day camp featuring Montpelier’s own Dan Abdo!
Dan Abdo author/illustrator of mega comic hits Blue, Barry and Pancakes, and Barb the Last Berzerker will be teaching a one time comic making workshop with Wilderarts! His animated television series, Rocket Monkeys, won The Canadian Screen Award for Best Animated Series or Program in 2015 and 2016.
In this workshop, Dan will walk through the entire comic making process and will conclude with the making of your very own mini comic! Kids will also get a sneak peak of never before seen Dan & Jason work. Everyone will go home with a stack of their own published comic strip, hot off the presses.
This will be a one day workshop, from 9am to 1pm. We will have breaks for snacks and lunch. All COVID protocols will be followed, and most of the workshop will be held outdoors under the Wilder Arts outdoor makerspace tent, weather permitting. All Wilder Arts staff is fully vaccinated. All participants must wear masks, regardless of vaccination status.
For ages 7 to 11
Monday 9am to 1pm | October 11, 2021