Education & Classes in North Miami Beach

More than just a creative outlet, art teaches students how to solve problems, set goals, communicate, and challenge themselves. The art instructors at Priscilla & Tiffany’s Art Corp. incorporate these lessons into each activity, whether students are using charcoal to sketch a winter scene or constructing a collage representing the report card they'd like to receive. As kids and adults work at easels or across large tables, the spacious studios are filled with carefully designed lighting and soft classical music.

In Great Balls of Yarn's four boutiques, knitters and crocheters of all experience levels browse more than 20,000 balls of yarn, including luxurious fibers from Trendsetter and Noro as well as hand-dyes from Prism and Malabrigo. Talented fiber artists guide knitters and crocheters as they transform vibrant fibers into wearable works of art during beginner through advanced classes. Project-specific sessions focus on creating table runners, borders for blankets, and baby booties to keep wee ones' feet warm and steps soundless during midnight refrigerator raids. Amid the shops' soft lighting, tapestries intermix with shelves of color-coded worsted and washable yarns alongside cashmeres and silks. Great Balls of Yarn also arms textile technicians with needles, notions, and books full of inspiration and yarn-charming incantations.

The intricately designed, European-style buildings that populate the Buenos Aires cityscape enchanted the eyes of Argentina native Cari Cohen at an early age, inspiring her to earn a degree in architecture from the University of Buenos Aires. Driven to push the boundaries of architectural innovation, Cari began delving into other creative media to expand her horizons, sparking a newfound fascination with abstract art and jewelry crafting. She has since moved to Miami, where her original paintings have been showcased at events such as Art Basel and Art Miami.

Cari founded The Fun Palette as a way to share her passion for the visual arts with kids and adults, hosting a variety of imagination-spurring classes for students of all skill and experience levels. During the studio's painting sessions, students can closely follow their instructor's step-by-step instructions to create flowing landscapes or abstract pieces or go off the beaten path to compose self-portraits that reimagine the painter as a bowl of fruit.

Some of Donn F. Flipse's earliest memories are of him wielding a broom, sweeping up the fallen petals and snipped-off stamen that have gathered around the feet of the floral designers at his family's flower shop. Eight-year-old Donn eventually moved up in rank, escorting arrangements to their destinations in the delivery truck as soon as he got his license. When he graduated college, he almost turned his back on the flower business his father and his grandfather built, but after mentoring under one of the shop's floral designers, he realized, “It was in [his] blood.” In 1990, he opened Field of Flowers in Davie.

The rose, he says, continues to be the most popular flower, although different breeds take the crown every so often—the current favorite is the garden rose, a throwback blossom like what might flourish in a well-tended backyard. Donn's favorites are the rose-like lisanthius and the Canterbury bells, which look delicate but are sturdy and long lasting, much like a quarterback who takes ballet classes.

Field of Flower's team of designers compose striking arrangements using popular flowers as well as rare blooms such as orchids or birds of paradise. The team also crafts design pieces for celebrations, with past creations including a french poodle sculpted from flowers and a Spongebob Squarepants–themed arrangements in which blue gel simulated the ocean, submerging plants in an under-the-sea wonderland.

ATA Flight School’s trusty fleet of Cessna aircrafts provides students with a way to get hands-on experience to earn their private-pilot certification or instrument ratings. Based out of North Perry General Aviation Airport, the FAA-approved professional flight school employs a staff of certified flight instructors who coach aspiring aviators along the way and give pep talks to airplanes prior to liftoff. ATA Flight School also operates Miami Flightseeing, which whisks passengers aloft for tours including The Grand Miami Tour, which flies high over 80 miles of beaches and Downtown Miami, and The Miami Sunset Tour, which reveals beautiful views of the sun as it sets over the Everglades.

StatusAir's Discovery Flight lessons grant spectacular views of South Florida as experienced instructors rated by Certified Flight Instructor-Instrument (CFII) school potential pilots and otherwise first-time flyers in the art of running a Cessna 172 plane. Along with comprehensive ground lessons, they'll also supervise the flights and end with a debriefing on the ground, gently reminding participants that capes are optional.