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By Leah Reddy

Hudson Square is a mecca for creative grown-ups. Stop in the Mae Mae Café (founded by artists) for lunch and you’ll rub elbows with photographers from Splashlight, the voices behind WNYC Radio, producers from Red Line Films and Epoch Films, graphic designers from Saatchi & Saatchi, and the creative geniuses behind @radical.media.

And Hudson Square will also soon become the neighborhood for creative kids, when the expanded Children’s Museum of the Arts (CMANY) opens at 345 Hudson Street.

“We’re thrilled to be in Hudson Square, working with a quality partner who has history and connection to the community,” David Kaplan, executive director of CMANY and a West Village native, said. “Our mission is to inspire the next generation of artists and art lovers, and to use art to build community.”

CMANY was founded in 1988, and was one of the world’s first children’s art museums. Children who visit—or who participate in oneof the museum’s public school outreach programs—create their own art, as well as view art made by children from around the world.

CMANY’s programs are hip and wideranging, and there’s nary a fruit-bowl still life in sight. Kids under five experiment with playdough, paints, and drumming, and older children can pick from classes in Japanese art, printmaking, and animation. For the 10–14 age group, the Film@5 and Fashion@5 programs build skills every kid wants to have.

The museum has always been located in SOHO, most recently in a space on Lafayette Street. The new Hudson Square space will provide room for an expansion of museum programs and galleries. 90,000 people are expected to visit CMANY each year once the museum is established at 345 Hudson Street.

“We’re mostly going to be doing more of what we’ve been doing,” Kaplan explained. “Our new space is an old loading dock with pillars and a great street front. We’re working to design a basic but functional space that meets our needs.”

The space will be anchored by a 2500 square foot gallery. “The power of the work we do with young people is that we’re able to display their work, a great self-esteem builder,” Kaplan said.

“The gallery will also serve as an inspirational springboard for everything we do in the museum.”

CMANY’s new space will also allow for more programs aimed at older children. “We’re designing the space so we can consciously age up into the tweens,” Kaplan said. “We’re creating a space where they won’t feel like they’re somewhere for little kids.”

And for those of us who aren’t kids, or tweens, or even teens, there’s value in children’s art. “You know, children’s art is very unfiltered, direct, and expressive. And I think it captures something instinctive and primitive in everyone,” Kaplan explains. “My favorite piece [in CMANY’s collection] is a picture of an urban-looking environment in the background and a field with children running and flowers in the foreground. It just captures what it’s like to be in New York City. I don’t remember the artist, but it was some 10-year-old, 20 years ago.”

--Leah Reddy is multimedia producer for Trinity Wall Street.