She spent more time developing it while the family was in quarantine during the pandemic. Nolley said she’s had the idea for Tiny Easel for some time, but really started working on it while on maternity leave with her third child last summer. She volunteers at Riderwood Elementary School in its Smart Art program, which introduces kindergarteners and first graders to art. They live in Ruxton and are raising three children: Elizabeth, 7, Kathryn, 4 and George, 1. She’s married to Dawson Nolley, a real estate agent with Cummings & Co.
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She started Tiny Easel in addition to her full time job as Developer and Designer for Terra Nova Ventures, a real estate company that was started by her father, David Tufaro, and specializes in the adaptive reuse of historic buildings, including Whitehall Mill and Mill No. This is the first retail venture for Nolley, a Baltimore native who graduated from Friends School and got a masters degree in interior architecture from the Corcoran School of the Arts and Design in Washington, D.C. I think everything in my life just keeps coming back to that moment with my mom doing watercolors.” I wanted to be a film production designer for years, working on sets. “I have always been taking art classes at MICA on the weekends,” she says. That led to other arts-related interests.
“She would bring a little set of watercolors and we would paint together.” Watercolor painting also reminds her of her childhood: “One of the things I remember as a child is doing watercolors with my mom when we would go on vacation,” she says. Acrylics can dry out, but watercolors last forever.” “Watercolors are amazing for kids,” she said. She added watercolor crayons and pencils to give a variety of mediums. Nolley said she chose watercolors over acrylics because they’re easy to work with and clean up. (Think 36-color palettes, brushes, sponges, spill-proof cups, coloring pages, activity guides, and, of course, a tiny easel.) All they need to add is water. Tiny Easel sells art activity kits that contain everything families need to make watercolor paintings, drawings, and sketches. Its motto is: “For little hands with big ideas.” Nolley, 37, launched the company this month, both online and with a pop-up shop at Whitehall Mill in Hampden. “Things that they could enjoy and that I could enjoy without hovering or worrying about the mess.” “I wanted activities that would hold their interest,” Nolley says. The goal, she says, is to make art fun and approachable for children, without being stressful for anyone else. She started Tiny Easel, a company that provides art in a box for budding artists-and the busy parents who want to encourage them. Unhappy with products already on the market, Nolley came up with a solution.
But the logistics of it all-finding the right supplies, getting prepared, cleaning up-were both challenging and stress-inducing. Working mom Jennifer Nolley loved to paint when she was growing up, and she wanted art and creativity to be part of her children’s lives, as well.
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