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Come in and create: BARN opens the door to a summer of making
Published 9:33 am Monday, June 15, 2026
Picture this: it’s a Sunday evening, and you’re standing at a lampworking torch on Bainbridge Island, shaping your first marble from molten glass. Or you’re pulling a pot of Oaxacan mole off the stove, learning a recipe that took a lifetime to develop. Or you’re at a forge, hammer in hand, watching a piece of steel become something you made yourself.
This is summer at BARN.
Who says summer break is only for kids? (Although they do have an extensive list of summer classes for youth and teens.) For all of us in Kitsap County, longer days offer a little more breathing room to relax, explore, and create. This summer, put that freedom to good use at BARN.
BARN’s mission is to grow and inspire a creative community through craft, learning, and service. And here’s something you might not expect: much of what happens inside is volunteer-driven. BARN’s 11 creative spaces, known as studios, are run by community volunteers, and the programming responds to what local artisans want to teach and what members want to learn.
You can feel the creative community the minute you walk through the door.
Across professionally equipped studios in glass, fiber, metal, wood, print, culinary and more, hundreds of people every year discover skills they didn’t know they had, make things with their hands for the first time, and meet friends they didn’t expect. Classes are open to the public, so a single afternoon or weekend workshop is all it takes to get started. Bring a friend and make a day of it on Bainbridge.
Not sure where to begin? Free Sunday tours let you walk the studios, ask questions, and get a feel for the place before committing to anything. See a glass torch lit, a loom strung, a printing press inked, or a 3D printer grinding away with a new creation.
BARN’s beginner-friendly classes require nothing but curiosity.
Want to travel without leaving Bainbridge Island? The Culinary Arts Studio’s summer lineup reads like a passport. Omid Roustaei leads a Persian Tea Party on June 25. Chef Sandra Evanoff teaches Brazilian Filet Mignon with Sauce Madère on July 5. The rest of the summer delivers Korean BBQ, South Indian dosa, Japanese tsukemono, Roman summer street foods and a Cookbook Potluck where home chefs make a recipe from a favorite book and bring it to share.
Or maybe Fiber Arts is your passion. Try Beginning Needlepoint on June 24. Get certified on a sewing machine in August with the Sewing Machine Orientation and Practice Project. Then keep going: hand-painted warps, tapestry study groups, natural dye work, basket coiling with pine needles, weaving with weeds.
Bronze bowls cast by Mario Oblak, instructor for BARN’s Foundry: Bronze Bowl Casting and Finishing class. Courtesy BARN
The Metal Fabrication program, which spans a machine shop, welding shop, sheet metal shop, and an offsite foundry and forge, offers everything from Make a Hammer to Foundry: Bronze Bowl Casting and Finishing. The sky, here, is genuinely the limit.
BARN provides a creative home base that grows with you. Dip your toe in with free and low-cost community events like Community Spoon Carving evenings, free weekly Zoom sprints alongside in-person critique circles, book clubs and craft workshops. Or dive right in to classes and multi-session workshops. Bring your creativity. They have everything else.
Registration is open to members and guests at bainbridgebarn.org. Browse the full calendar, explore membership, or get directions before you go. Grab a friend, pick a class, and come in and create.