Education & Classes in Cliffside Park

At BakeZaria, culinary-savvy instructors teach novice bakers to handcraft their own desserts. Workshops show guests how to create artfully decorated sugar cookies, moist cake pops, or cupcakes in flavors such as dulce de leche or chocolate peanut butter using nothing more than eggs, flower, and a standard shrink ray.

After earning his BFA at the nationally renowned Rhode Island School of Design, Kevin Tarasuk began exhibiting his darkly surreal paintings at galleries around his hometown of Miami before making the move to New York City. Now, he helms the Painting Lounge, a personable art studio where students learn the proper techniques of painting, such as composition, shading, and glaring at clocks until they melt. In workshops, Tarasuk has earned praise from his ecstatic students, who have heralded him as “a very, very talented artist” and “a patient and engaging teacher.”

Chef Jhonathan E. Rupchand began The BlueBurner Culinary Cookery to share his long-earned cooking knowledge with clients who wish to create memorable dining experiences for their families and friends. Founder of Truffle & Basil Private Chef Group—a private chef company known for its use of natural, farm-fresh ingredients—Jhonathan brings his long-time love of food arts to classes that improve skills, demystify food chemistry, and help students create the perfect bite. During culinary classes the center's instructor-chefs share basics such as knife skills, grilling, baking, and sculpting cake busts of Marie Antoinette that make home-cooking feats attractive and easier to execute. As students ascend in skill level, they may choose to attend Level 3 classes in Italian and French cooking styles or Level 4's advanced meat- and-fish preparation techniques.

The recipe for a successful cooking class requires the right mix of teacher, chef, and nutritionist—a balance that each instructor strikes at Young Chef Academy. They host students aged 4–18 in weekly cooking classes which regularly change recipes while sticking to the monthly theme. They cater to individual children, school field trips, and even scout troops. They even teach kids how to make their own treats during birthday parties, such as birthday cakes that come out of the oven already on fire and ready to be blown out.

At Modnitsa Atelier, Dina Rudman works with clients from head to toe. The Fashion Institute of Technology grad and trained image consultant knows that every detail of someone’s appearance has a chance to set them apart from the crowd and make an impression on everyone they meet or accidentally spill something on. Through evaluations, personal shopping trips, and "closet edit" sessions, Rudman shepherds men and women toward personalized sartorial sophistication. She's also a trained makeup artist who preps mugs for headshots and events, using a deep knowledge of color theory that also guides her creation of custom jewelry designed to illuminate the recipient’s unique style and complexion. The one-woman styling team isn’t shy about sharing the wealth of her expertise—she also teaches jewelry-making classes, which Brides has recommended as a way to pep up a bachelorette-party outing.

It’s tough to get tree frogs, toucans, and monkeys to sit still in a studio. That's why the leaders of the Academy of Photo Arts take photography trips to Costa Rica, where they can find exotic wildlife in its natural habitat before capturing it on film. The photography academy’s travel courses can also whisk students off to Venice’s picturesque canals, or to Las Vegas to capture shots of the Grand Canyon or the landfill where all copies of Vegas Vacation are buried.

The school hosts Toronto-based courses as well, where keen-eyed photographers lead interactive workshops on wildlife photography and landscape photography. The in-studio courses, meanwhile, focus on techniques that help artists create flattering lighting setups, perform seamless Photoshop edits, and unscrew lens caps rather than smashing them to pieces in frustration. Their camera-service department keeps cameras in working order by aligning lenses and repairing broken parts.