Coastal Arts Center Wraps an ‘Epic’ Summer of Kids’ Camps

The summer of 2026 was an epic one at the Coastal Arts Center, where children from Orange Beach to Alaska created art in the studios and took part in camps that filled the center’s calendar week after week. Young artists from across the region and far beyond Alabama’s borders gathered in the beachside studios for a summer of hands-on creativity.

Campers experienced a wide range of activities, including glass blowing, sculpting, painting, carving and printing, along with plenty of time for unstructured play that let imaginations run. The mix of media gave children the rare chance to try art forms that most communities never offer at all, let alone to elementary and middle school students.

Glass blowing in particular sets the Coastal Arts Center apart. Working with molten glass under the close supervision of trained instructors, campers watched as their ideas took shape in fiery furnaces, an experience that tends to become the highlight of the summer for many of the young participants.

This summer’s camp theme was Support Local Artists, a message the young creators embraced enthusiastically throughout their weeks at the center. The theme connected the campers’ own work to the wider community of artists who live and work along Alabama’s Gulf Coast, encouraging children to see art not just as a pastime but as a livelihood and a local tradition worth celebrating.

A Summer of Creativity at the Beach

The Coastal Arts Center of Orange Beach sits along Wolf Bay, a setting that has made it a destination for artists and art lovers across the Gulf Coast. Its studios, galleries and grounds host classes, exhibitions and community events year-round, but the summer camps are among its most visible and beloved programs.

Each summer, the camps draw children from Orange Beach, Gulf Shores and the surrounding Baldwin County communities, along with visiting families who plan their beach vacations around camp sessions. The 2026 season’s reach stretched as far as Alaska, evidence of the center’s growing reputation among families looking for enriching activities to pair with a trip to the coast.

The camp model blends structured instruction with creative freedom. Mornings might be devoted to a specific technique, such as carving or printmaking, while afternoons open the studios for play and experimentation. Instructors emphasize process over product, encouraging young artists to take risks and learn from the results.

For many campers, the experience is their first exposure to disciplines like glass work and sculpture. Introducing those art forms early can spark interests that last a lifetime, and center staff regularly see returning students whose first visit to the studios came during a summer camp session years earlier.

CASA’s Mission of Educating Young Artists

The Coastal Arts Student Academy, known as CASA, works to educate and uplift young artists while teaching all visitors to appreciate the arts. The organization operates as the educational heart of the Coastal Arts Center’s mission, connecting the center’s studios and instructors with students from across the community.

CASA’s programs reach beyond the summer camps. Throughout the year, the academy supports classes and workshops designed to build skills, confidence and an appreciation for the arts among students of all ages. The goal is to make serious arts education accessible in a growing coastal community where families might otherwise travel to Mobile or Pensacola for similar opportunities.

The Support Local Artists theme gave CASA a natural teaching frame this summer. Campers learned that art is made by their neighbors, that artists contribute to the cultural and economic life of Orange Beach, and that supporting creative work in one’s own community is something even a young collector can do.

That message resonates in a town where the arts have become part of the local identity alongside fishing, boating and beach tourism. Events, galleries and public art across Orange Beach depend on a healthy community of local creators, and programs that introduce children to the arts help sustain that community for the next generation.

Why Arts Education Matters on the Gulf Coast

Communities across Baldwin County have grown quickly in recent decades, and with that growth has come rising demand for cultural programming. The Coastal Arts Center has answered that demand with a facility and program lineup that rival those of much larger cities, offering residents and visitors a chance to see, make and buy art without leaving the beach.

Arts education carries benefits that extend well beyond the studio. Research has long linked creative learning to stronger problem-solving skills, improved academic performance and greater confidence in children. For coastal communities that attract families from around the country, offering high-quality arts programming is also part of the quality-of-life picture that draws new residents.

The center’s summer camps also serve a practical role for local parents. Summer months present a childcare challenge for working families, and camps that combine supervision with genuine enrichment fill a real need. The fact that campers come home with sculptures, prints and glass pieces makes the value easy to see.

Visiting families, meanwhile, get more than a babysitting service. A week of camps can turn an ordinary beach vacation into a memorable creative experience, and many of those families return year after year, adding the center to their list of summer traditions alongside the sand and the surf.

Inside the Studios: What Campers Learned

The variety of media offered this summer gave every camper a chance to find something that fit. Painting and drawing built foundational skills that carry into every other discipline. Sculpting and carving taught patience and spatial thinking. Printmaking introduced the idea of making multiples, turning a single design into a series of finished pieces.

Glass blowing remained the centerpiece. Few places in the country let children work with hot glass, and the Coastal Arts Center’s furnace and studio staff made it possible safely. Campers learned how molten glass moves, how breath and rotation shape a bubble, and why teamwork matters when one artist gathers glass while another shapes it.

The playing component of the camp schedule may have looked the least serious, but it served a purpose. Unstructured creative play is where children test ideas without fear of judgment, and instructors used those sessions to observe where each camper’s interests were heading, then steered them toward media that matched.

By the end of each session, campers had built a portfolio of work spanning several disciplines, along with memories of a summer spent making things with their own hands. For the youngest artists, those first finished pieces often become treasured keepsakes for families, physical proof of a summer well spent.

Fall Registration Now Open

With the epic summer of 2026 wrapped, attention at the Coastal Arts Center has turned to the fall. Registration for CASA classes is now open, with a registration link available on the Coastal Arts Center website. Families who missed out on summer camps, or who simply want to keep the momentum going, can sign up for the academy’s fall lineup.

Fall classes typically offer a deeper dive than the summer camps, with weekly sessions that allow students to develop skills over time rather than cramming a range of media into a single week. Students who discovered a passion for glass, clay or printmaking this summer can pursue it in earnest once school is back in session.

Center staff encourage families to register early. Popular classes and instructors fill quickly, particularly in a growing community where word of mouth about the summer camps travels fast. The online registration link makes the process simple for both year-round residents and repeat vacationing families planning their fall trips.

A Community Investment in the Arts

The Coastal Arts Center’s growth reflects a broader story in Orange Beach, a city that has invested in cultural amenities alongside its better-known natural ones. Arts centers, museums and performance venues increasingly share the map with boat launches and beach access points, giving the community a richer year-round identity.

For the young artists who spent the summer of 2026 in the studios, the experience planted seeds that may grow in unexpected directions. Some will return each summer until they age out of camp, then come back as assistants and instructors. Others will carry an appreciation for the arts into whatever careers they choose, remaining the kind of audiences and patrons that local artists depend on.

That is the long game CASA is playing. Educating and uplifting young artists is not just about producing the next generation of creators; it is about building a community that values art enough to support it, attend it and pass it along. The epic summer of 2026, with campers from Orange Beach to Alaska painting, carving, printing and blowing glass under a Support Local Artists banner, was a strong step in that direction.

Families interested in fall classes can find schedules, class descriptions and the registration link through the Coastal Arts Center’s website, and center staff are available to help match students with the right class as the new season begins.