‘Just a Happy Place’

Clay College welcomes all those looking to expand their creativity—in clay and many other artforms.

Linda Reim and her daughter, Sherry Reim, sort through bits of colored glass at a worktable inside Millville’s Clay College. The brick-faced High Street building, at 321 N. High St., is the artsy extension of Rowan College South Jersey, a place where credited and noncredit classes keep the building buzzing.

The Reims, and the other half-dozen women in the class, have been here before— many times. The women, former members of a spin class at Vineland’s YMCA, gather to flex their creativity, laugh and catch up. 

Today’s challenge is a mosaic class: Reassemble bits of broken glass or colored orbs onto smooth, plain tiles. The Reims hope to create colorful address plaques as a gift for friends.

The Clay College has become a creative home, of sorts, for regulars like the Reims. 

“We’re really like a family,” said Jackie Sandro-Greenwell, director of the Clay College inside the Arts and Innovation Center. “It’s a place where people can leave all their woes and worries at the threshold and bond during a creative activity. It’s a very nurturing environment. When someone new comes in, there’s no feeling of, ‘I feel lost or weird about asking a question.’ ”

While kids return to school, the Clay College is also kicking off its new fall semester of non-credited workshops and classes—everything from designing your own butter dish, ceramic jewelry and pendants to creating a snowman, Santa or an enameled pumpkin. 

Linda Reim has taken so many classes that she has started to work on projects at home as well. She appreciates the good vibes she and her daughter enjoy at Clay College.

For four or five years, Linda Reim said she has made everything from jewelry to sculpted frogs and dragons. “I’ve done so many things. I’ve built birdhouses, I’ve done garden art. I love the Clay College. I love working with clay. It’s a great feeling.”

The Clay College first opened on High Street in 2002 in a different location near the former Winfield’s restaurant. Its new building opened its doors in 2017, only to be shut down by Covid in 2020. However, that did not stop Sandro, who created an alternative way to keep the creativity flowing. Parking Lot Pottery was Sandro’s response to the COVID crisis, which the director believes helped cement Clay College’s place in the region.

“We made up little kits, everything we needed for the class. People would pick it up and we would hold the class (online),” she said.

Chris Ward Garrison, a Maurice River Township resident, appreciates the fact that Clay College classes aren’t simply for the purely artistic types.

The classes also help keep their friendship strong.

“It’s a wonderful thing,” said Garrison, who led the YMCA spin class that first brought the group together. Some of the group refer to her as their “cruise director” because she leads it and organizes activities.

“I appreciate these ladies and their friendship immensely,” she said. “It’s just a fun thing to do.” 

The classes also are not intimidating, Garrison added. That’s a sentiment echoed by Linda Reim, who has grown more confident in her artistic abilities in the five or so years she has participated.

“I can come in here, get a lump of clay, do my thing and bring it back,” she said.

Reim recalled that for Clay College’s Face Mug class, she brought in a pair of dentures and added them to the mug. 

“You can do anything like that,” said Linda Reim, 74. She also redesigned two glass tables in her garden in a mosaic design, using glass beads from a vase owned by her late mother.

“I have a part of her,” she said, tearing up. “I think of my mom. I think that she’s with me. I sit in the sun (at a table) and I have my tea and have a peaceful moment, because she’s with me.”

Bringing art to the community: People drive a distance to take classes at Clay College, Sandro said.

Truth is, you will have a hard time finding a place quite like it. “It’s a unique facility. I don’t think there’s anything like it in the state,” said Sandro, suggesting perhaps Philadelphia as the closest location.

The Clay College also partners with Wheaton Arts and the community to bring the spirit of the arts to those who may not be exposed to it, including residents in senior housing and high rises around the region. 

Sandro said Clay College has also worked with local schools, offered free crafts during Wheaton Arts’ Fall Festival and on Third Fridays. She hopes more of the community catches on to the magic that the Clay College and the Arts and Innovation Center have to offer. 

“I would like to have more promotions of the classes and what we do here,” she said. “We have a pretty big non-credit enrollment of about 80 to 100 people.’

First, visitors might decide to take an intro to clay class and might even take it a few times. Then, as they progress, they start to get the hang of it and take more advanced levels. They are even welcome to come to Clay College to work on their projects on their own if they need to do so.

“People will get the bug,” Sandro said, adding that clay is tactile and unthreatening. She said clay is appealing because people can make a bowl or a vase or something they can use.

—Jackie Sandro-Greenwell, director of the Clay College inside the Arts and Innovation Center

The holidays are a busy time for Clay College, starting with Halloween and the popular pottery pumpkin workshops. Staffers at Clay College will make a starter orb, then visitors will select one and decorate them into their own jack-o’-lanterns. 

Snowman projects work in a similar way: Staff will “throw,” or make, blank snowmen and those who sign up for a class add their own style and details to it.

It’s a welcoming spot to laugh and enjoy friends, all while getting into the holiday spirit. (Visit claycollege.com for a complete list of fall classes.) 

Just a happy place: “If only I had a dime for everyone who said, ‘This is our happy place. This is our therapy,’ ” Sandro said.

Rowan College of South Jersey’s Arts and Innovation Center doesn’t just focus on pottery and clay, but welcomes the arts as a whole, including fine arts, such as drawing, sculpture, and art history.

Today, a variety of fall classes are held on the second floor of the facility. The main campus schedules the credited courses. Then, the downstairs rooms will also be used for credited courses such as art appreciation or art history. Upstairs rooms are largely used for fine arts such as painting, drawing, print-making, and 3-D design. “We offer an associate’s in fine arts,” she said.

Sandro herself consulted with architects and designers to plan the space properly.

“I was really grateful for that,” she said. “A lot of times that doesn’t happen. It was really awesome that I was able to interject and have a say.”

Over time, Sandro and staff have worked to bump up enrollment, making it possible to hire a new full-time administrative assistant, Randy Wilfong.

It’s a peaceful community that Sandro has helped create, and that thought makes her a little emotional.

“It’s a nurturing, inviting environment,” she said. “It’s been that way since day one. It’s just a happy place. It’s a community. If you’ve been there for any length of time, you become part of that community.”

She hopes to spread that spirit all over Cumberland County and beyond.

“We want to try and engage the community in a positive way to encourage creativity and add some enrollment,” she said. “We’re trying to get everyone more engaged.”

New to the Arts and Innovation Center: The AIC has introduced a new Fiber Arts area and classes to the college facility in Millville. It’s located in the front window of the center, where those passing by can watch people craft crocheted snowmen, pumpkins or stockings, to name a few items. 

In addition, six classes, ranging from two weeks to eight, are scheduled and will be held there, covering everything from introductions to crocheting or knitting to a class on Granny Squares and individual classes to make crocheted pumpkins, snowmen, or stockings.

“It’s a beautiful window and it’s really cool to see people weaving or knitting,” Sandro said.

Local residents also may want to participate in a series of free fiber arts workshops coming this fall. 

Charity Squares Workshop will be held from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on September 6 at the AIC. A second Charity Squares Workshop will be held from 1 to 3 p.m. on September 13. An instructor will be on site to demonstrate the craft, which the center hopes to donate to animals at the South Jersey Regional Animal Shelter in Vineland.

A second free craft is also scheduled. Twiddle Mitts are worn on the arm with various textures woven into them, such as beads. The mitts, which resemble fingerless gloves, help dementia patients or those with developmental issues. These mitts are worn on the hands to feel the different textures. There will be two sessions:

Free Twiddle Mitt workshops: 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. September 20 and 1 to 3 p.m. September 27 at the Art and Innovation Center in Millville. (Visit claycollege.com for a complete list of fall classes.)