To keep your customers happy, supply a combination of white, red, and rose wine. If you have a theme and keep the wines topical, take a look at these sip n’ paint class wine pairing ideas. Some paint and sips also provide cocktails as an option, so this is worth considering if you know a skilled bartender or two!
How To Teach A Paint And Sip Class: All You Need To Know
Paint and sips bring friends, family, and communities together and are the ideal way for your customers to hang out for the evening and catch up. They’re also the perfect way to celebrate date nights, bachelorette parties, and birthday parties!
Once you’ve decided how much to charge for your creative workshop and started your paint and sip business, the next step is to teach your first class! Below, we’ve put together a guide on how to get started, a checklist of what you need, and some tips and tricks to show you how to teach a paint and sip class.
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How do you get started?
Knowing where to start and finding inspiration can be tricky. Follow these steps to get you on the right path.
Decide what you will teach
Your business may have art templates, access to copyrighted images, or you may focus on painting something that’s in the room with you. So, for your first lesson, decide what you’ll teach! Use resources such as Pinterest, Google Image Search, and YouTube videos to help inspire you.
Create a sample painting
By now, you should have a good idea of the time you have available in your sessions. Is it an hour, two hours or three?
The amount of time you have will also dictate what you can and can’t draw. Try creating a sample painting and timing how long it takes you to paint it by following instructions.
Remember that your live classes will also need to include time for introductions, extra painting time for those who need help, time for the artwork to be dried and varnished, and time for your customers to sip and enjoy!
Get your supplies together
Now that you have a better idea of what you’re going to be painting, get your supplies ready. We recommend buying them wholesale wherever possible to reduce your costs. Below is a table of all the art supplies that you’ll need for each person that you’ll teach.
| Item | Volume (per person) |
| A chair | 1 |
| Paintbrushes in a range of sizes | 5-6 |
| An easel | 1 |
| An apron or clothes covering | 1 |
| A paint palette | 1 |
| Acrylic paints | 10 x 2oz paints |
| A canvas | 1 |
| Rags, towels, or kitchen towel | 1-2 |
| A water cup for rinsing brushes | 1 |
| Wine | 1 bottle |
| A wine glass | 1 |
| Snack pots or plates | 1 |
Set up the painting zone
Now that you have all the prep work done, you’ll need to set up the painting area before your workshop starts.
- Set up the easels and canvases
- Make sure each easel and space has the correct brush sizes needed for the painting
- Add a paint palette with a spatula palette knife for mixing
- Provide a jar or cup of water for washing brushes
- Place down all paints required
- Add rags and paper towels
- Provide aprons on each chair.
Besides the painting zone, you’ll also need a space to prep and dry the paintings once done. Here, you’ll want:
- A hairdryer or other drying rack to speed up the drying process
- Varnish for finishing.
Find Deals on Painting Lessons Near You
Lesson One: Bring friends, family, and wine. Having a support system (and alcohol) calms the nerves and makes the whole thing more fun.
Jessica Hess, the studio’s owner, and Christine DiMiceli, the evening’s instructor, greeted me right away. They both told me not to worry about my lack of experience—these classes are basically acrylic painting for beginners—and Christine handed me my brushes. Thankfully, they came with easy-to-remember names like Big Brush and Baby Brush. She then gave me a basic palette and directed me to the paints, which had pump-top dispensers and clear instructions for exactly how much I would need. We’d all be working on the same painting—“Rainy Day”—which depicted silhouetted figures against an abstract, rain-swept background.
Lesson Two: More adventurous students can pick their own colors or even paint something entirely different, but most people play it safe and follow the instructions.
I poured a glass of wine and took a stool next to my friends Mike and Anita, the three of us at the end of a long table that held our easels and blank canvases. Christine stepped onto the small stage at the front of the class and began to paint. We all followed along, starting with a simple gray background. I mixed black and white paint directly on the table—the studio had covered the table surfaces in white paper, making things extra easy. Even better, the staff would take care of cleaning everything afterward … except for my jeans.
Lesson Three: Wear old clothes, or an outfit you think would look better with a few random streaks of paint.
I used Big Brush to make wide strokes, occasionally dipping its bristles into water. Christine, meanwhile, walked the room and gave advice, which for me was, “Don’t be afraid to use more paint.” The next hour or so passed in a blur of activity as Christine taught us how to paint with acrylics: she showed us how to transform rectangles and teardrops into people, dots and half-circles into umbrellas, and streaks of red, yellow, and blue into a rainy scene. She even painted larger examples on a separate paper, breaking down the painting’s more detailed parts into easy-to-follow steps. The only thing she didn’t teach me to paint was my signature, and I probably made it too big.
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Lesson Four: Don’t be afraid to ask for help, even in the smallest details. The instructor can also tell you how to recover from mistakes.
Christine’s encouragement kept me from turning into a bundle of nerves, as did having my friends nearby. We laughed and assured one another that our paintings were fine. I wasn’t convinced, but I was thankful that they were the only ones who could see my work—until I heard the words “we’re done,” and it was time to pose for photos.
This was when the drinks helped, though I was too focused during the class to down more than a glass and a half. The “BYOB” in BYOB painting classes seemed more about creating a fun atmosphere, and having a glass of budget wine in hand made me realize no one was really there to judge my work.
Lesson Five: Almost everyone thinks their painting is the worst. At the end of the class, you see that yours and everyone else’s is good, even if they don’t look exactly like the example.
At the end, I posed unabashedly with my finished painting. I even plan to hang it in my apartment. Though probably at the end of the hallway, because as my Arts n Spirits instructor taught me, even great art looks better from a few feet away.
Still nervous? Watch our video to see what to expect:
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