Photo by Rebecca Sanabria.
After opening its permanent location two years ago, the Imaginarium art school had about 200 students enrolled this past year.
“We’ve grown quite a lot since we opened,” owner Brandye James said.
Imaginarium offers after school enrichment classes for toddlers, preschoolers and elementary-aged children in Lakewood at 6500 E. Mockingbird Lane as well as at the new University Park location at Northway Christian Church, which opened in January.
Before opening on Mockingbird Lane, the Imaginarium previously held classes at Skillman Church of Christ.
“We started out literally with 20 kids in a classroom one day a week at Skillman four years ago,” James said.
Moving into the space on Mockingbird also allowed Imaginarium to be able to offer more classes, James said. In addition to art, children in Lakewood can take classes on drawing, cartoons and graphic design, architecture and interior design, sewing and fiber arts, the art of crochet, and Lego robotics . The Imaginarium also hosts summer camps.
“We really believe in the power of hands-on learning, and so that’s really our focus,” James said. “We want kids off of screens and making things.”
The learning environment at the Imaginarium is structured, but it’s not like school, James said. Children are free to be creative.
“They’re very much in a very heavy, intense testing environment in school these days, very driven by test scores and testing,” she said. “As a (gifted and talented) teacher and an art teacher myself — I used to teach public school before I opened Imaginarium. — I just discovered that in those classes, when I was teaching GT and teaching art, I mean kids … they really just loved it, and they found their voices, and they felt so free to express themselves, and their confidence grew. And I think, personally, I’ve just seen the impact that this kind of learning can have on a kid, and that’s what really inspired me to do it.”
Last month, the Imaginarium students’ hard work was put on display at the end-of-year show. Instead of simply hanging up the art like in previous years, the children’s art projects were categorized into exhibits at the show. One of those exhibits was themed as the Imaginarium restaurant.
“We have lots of different things in the restaurant, from chandeliers to clay plates to the table cloths that the sewing class created,” James said. “The whole environment was created by kids.”
Most of the classes at Imaginarium cost $200 per month for the August through May schedule, according to the website. James said scholarships are available for families who can’t afford classes.
To register for classes or camps, click here.
