The Art & History of Jell-O Molds

with Sara Clugage

September 13, 10:00 a.m.–1:00 p.m.

Tuition: $100

Materials Fee: $20

In this practical workshop, participants will create jelly dishes inspired by sculptural gelatin creations from the 18th century to the present. We will learn how to layer ribbon jellies, turn out specialized molds, and carve agar into geometric shapes. Recipes will be staggered through the class to allow for chill times. All molds and materials will be provided.

Plan to bring: if you have molds of your own to experiment with, or small objects you would like to see encased in Jell-O, please bring them with you.

Sara Clugage’s art practice focuses on economic and political issues in craft and food. She is Editor-in-Chief of Dilettante Army, an online magazine for visual culture and critical theory, and a 2024-2025 culinary resident at Ox-Bow School of Art and Artists’ Residency. Sara has most recently been core faculty for the MA in Critical Craft Studies program at Warren Wilson College, and her most recent publication is the 2021 monograph from the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, "New Recipes: Cooking, Craft, and Performance." She is currently at work on a book project about Jell-O, animacy, and abstraction.

Here’s What Matters: Starting a Memoir

with Jack Ridl

September 13, 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Tuition: $200

Materials Fee: N/A

Participants will spend the day exploring, through their preferred form of writing, the things that have profoundly impacted their own lives—whether they are funny, traumatic, serious, sorrowful, or joyous—and turn these stories into the beginnings of a memoir. Using Jack’s suggestions, writers will first talk with one another about what subject they have chosen then, they will have time to explore that choice in writing, after which the group will engage in a delightful debriefing about what showed up as they wrote, culminating in a deeply memorable day.

Plan to bring: Writing utensils and paper or notebook and memorable tokens from your life that may inspire writing.

Jack Ridl, Poet Laureate of Douglas, Michigan, is the author of All At Once (CavanKerry Press), Saint Peter and the Goldfinch (Wayne State University Press), and several other books. His Practicing to Walk Like a Heron was co-recipient of the National Gold Medal for Best Collection of Poetry by ForeWord Reviews. His collection Broken Symmetry was co-recipient of The Society of Midland Authors best book of poetry award for 2006. Then Poet Laureate Billy Collins selected his Against Elegies for The Center for Book Arts Chapbook Award. Individual poems have been published in The Georgia Review, Poetry, Colorado Review, Rattle, North American Review, Prairie Schooner, Field, Poetry East, and elsewhere. The students at Hope College named him both their Outstanding Professor and their Favorite Professor, and in 1996 The Carnegie Foundation named him Michigan Professor of the Year. More than 85 of Jack’s students have earned their MFA degree and over 100 are published. Every Thursday Jack hosts and posts on YouTube “The Sentimentalist.” Poetry and Song: A Concert with Carrie Newcomer and Jack Ridl is also available on YouTube. For further information about Jack, his website is www.ridl.com.

Autumnal Arrangements

with Maddie Reyna

September 27, 10:00–1:00 p.m.

Tuition: $100

Materials Fee: $30

Create a festive centerpiece with autumnal florals and other organic materials while considering foundational historical floral styles including Dutch Baroque, Ikebana, and contemporary movements. Participants will experiment with vessel armature techniques such as wire mesh, pin frog, and tape grid. Local flowers from White Barn Flower Farm in Holland, Michigan, will be provided to each participant, and after demonstration, arranging, and group discussion, they will take their ephemeral arrangement home.

Plan to bring: A vessel, garden shears, garden gloves, a box to transport your arrangement.

Maddie Reyna is an American painter who began arranging flowers as a way to have live subjects for her work. That practice has come to stand alone as she applies considerations of color, form, and composition to three-dimensional organic matter. She has a Masters in Painting and Drawing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, studied at The Flower School of New York, designs flower arrangements for brides and other party throwers in Chicago, and is the Education Director for Ox-Bow School of Art & Artists’ Residency.

Introduction to Basket Weaving

with Dee Clements

September 27, 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Tuition: $200

Materials Fee: $30

In this six-hour session, you'll learn to create a small, round woven basket from start to finish, including how to begin the base, build the side walls, use two basic weaving techniques, and finish with a border or rim. No prior experience is necessary and each participant will be able to bring their basket and reed home.

Plan to bring: All materials are provided.

Dee Clements (she/her) is a process-based artist with interests in materials, craft, and ethnography. She holds an MFA in 3D Design from Cranbrook Academy of Art and a BFA in Fiber and Materials Studies and Sculpture from the School of The Art Institute of Chicago. She has shown her sculptural basketry work in galleries and art fairs internationally, and in 2025, she started The Weaving Workshop in Chicago, an artist-run workshop school that provides quality art education and creative skill development in basketry, off-loom weaving, and fiber crafts.

Contemporary Buttercream Piping Techniques

with Edward Cabral

September 27, 3:00–6:00 p.m.

Tuition: $100

Materials Fee: $20

This workshop will be a crash-course on using a pastry bag and either a star or round tip to decorate your bakes. Students will practice piping designs in buttercream while discussing further applications in pastry, including professional baking tips and a Q&A with the chef and host. Students will go home with a slice of cake they helped decorate (dairy, gluten).

Plan to bring: An apron and any additional piping tips you'd like to practice.

Edward Cabral (he/him) is a sculptor and chef living in Brooklyn. He is currently a Culinary Artist-in-Residence at Ox-Bow. His research-based practice encompasses traditional art, edible sculpture, performance, and impermanent objects. He received his BA in Visual Critical Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2011. He has exhibited at Williams College Museum of Art (Massachusetts), Roots and Culture, Heaven Gallery (Illinois), Alexander Gray Associates, The Drawing Center, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, and Superhouse (New York). He has been interviewed in Mold Magazine, Architectural Digest, and CakeZine, and has appeared on the History Channel, Disney+, and The Food Network.

The Felted Slipper

with Kelly D. Brandt

October 11, 10 a.m.–5 p.m.

Tuition: $200

Materials Fee: $30

Use wet felting techniques to create slippers that will keep your feet nice and warm and make an artistic statement as well! We will introduce the wet inlay technique to decorate your slippers, and add locks or flaps to give your creation a three dimensional effect. You will learn a technique for making a matching pair! These boots would be suitable to have leather applied to the sole afterward.

Plan to bring: Two or three old towels for soaking up soapy water, a large cellulose sponge. Optional: dishwashing gloves if you do not like having your hands in soapy water; any fibers or yarns of your own that you might want to incorporate in your project.

Kelly Dubois Brandt (she/her) started on her wool craft odyssey in 1975 with four heritage horned Dorset sheep who came to her five acre homestead in Lake Odessa "just to keep the pasture down." As an accomplished seamstress, she first used her wool harvest in wool-filled comforters, but soon taught herself to locker hook, spin, and felt. She first got involved in FiberFest in Hastings, Michigan in the early 1980s and has been teaching since 1985 in Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin. She is a published author and has won artistic awards for her work using wool and llama fiber from her flocks. Through her fiber based cottage business, Team Effort Artisans, Kelly has shown and sold fine wool craft at shows, galleries, and festivals.  She offers private classes at her new studio/barn outside Lake Odessa as well as through select locations.