Son’s medical condition inspires woman to open sensory art studio
RIDGEFIELD — When COVID-19 hit, Ridgefield resident Rosie Snow Voulgaris’ son’s special needs services all became virtual.
“He was only 2 at the time, so virtual therapy for a 2-year-old was such a joke. Feeding therapy, speech therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, all of it was virtual and it was useless,” said Voulgaris, whose son, Christian, has a rare genetic disease called Dup15Q syndrome, which affects children cognitively and developmentally.
Voulgaris started looking into ways to help Christian at home and discovered sensory bins — which later inspired her to open her sensory business, called Pop Art Kids!
“Sensory bins are bins that you fill with materials that you can scoop and pour,” said Voulgaris, who is 38 and also the mother of 3- and 7-yearold daughters, Emma and Philippa. “I was using these small sensory bins with him at home. I saw how much fun he had doing them with me. And then I saw my my older daughter — how she interacted with them. And that’s how I first got the idea to turn (the sensory bins) into a business.”
In September 2023, she opened Pop Art Kids! at 80 Grove St., which has “mommy and me” or “caregiver and me” classes for children from birth to 5 years old. She opened a second location in early January with the same name, on 30 Tomahawk St. in Somers, N.Y. At both locations, children can play at six different sensory stations.
“There’s no right or wrong way to start and there’s no order and there’s no time limit,” said Voulgaris, who previously co-owned 2 Blue Hens, which offered pop art playgroup, preschool crew, and art club programs in a different suite at the same location as her current business. The 2 Blue Hens opened in 2022 and closed the following year. She opened Pop Art Kids! next door to her previous business, which is now occupied by JW Brown Photography.
Aside from opening even more Pop Art Kids! studios in the future, she said her goal is to make parents aware of how art should be taught to toddlers.
“Art for a toddler is feeling textures, being able to over-squeeze glue and see what happens,” said Voulgaris, who has a bachelor of fine arts degree. Before having children, she worked in the advertising, marketing and design fields. “It’s OK to get messy in class. We embrace that because they’re all decisions that (the children are) making and then they get to see the results and what happens.”
Ridgefield resident Sophia Shkreli, who takes her 5-year-old son Oliver Shkreli to the studio, said Voulgaris has created “a fairytale setting” for children to play and learn.
“It’s a place you can feel relaxed and watch your children have a great time creating art while engaging in sensory fun,” she said.
‘Choose what they want to play with’
Voulgaris said children of all abilities are welcome to attend any class in the studio.
“For some kids, like my son, going to a typical class is just too much for him. … He gets very overwhelmed,” said Voulgaris, who said when Christian was first diagnosed as an infant, no one was able to give her a clear picture of what his future looked like.
“The doctors were able to tell us things like he may never walk, he never talk, he may never live independently. He may develop seizures that are untreatable,” she said. While she said he’s still labeled as nonverbal now, she discovered that, using Play-Doh balls, he can count out loud to 10.
The studio has a dry sensory station containing either colored rice, beans, oats or corn kernels. There’s also a messy sensory station, which can include shaving cream, where children color or scoop cooked spaghetti. There’s also a Play-Doh table.
The studio’s class for children with special needs has fewer children than the other classes and is taught by a licensed speech pathologist.
Redding resident Lauren Murphy, who goes to the studio with her sons Benjamin Murphy, 3, and Cameron Murphy, 18 months, said Voulgaris has created an environment where kids can learn by exploring.
“My sons love the freedom to walk around and choose what they want to play with. Some days, my 18 month old prefers to get messy and paint with ‘anything but a paintbrush.’ Other days, he loves to sit in the rice bin and feel it in between his toes,” she said. “My 3 year old loves to scoop in the dry bins or check out what magic is happening at the wet station.”