Cafe Elie

I found Café Elie after buying a Living Social deal for a wine and painting class. I came with a group of friends and we each brought our own wine and came ready for laughs and a unique and memorable experience. It was! Elie (pronounced Eel-​ee) is the owner and is originally from France. He has been painting and showcasing his art since he was a teen. He now spends his days enjoying the arts (mostly painting) and sharing his talents with others. His shop is in an unassuming strip mall (on Main Street in Cornelius, near Davidson, just past Habitat for Humanity and just before Carolina Cones and the YMCA).
He provides all kinds of classes, painting, drawing, sketching, etc. He provides private lessons, as well as group lessons, and my favorite (I’m not an artist!), the Sip and Paint classes.
He occasionally offers Living Social or occasional deals, but if you call ahead and have a group coming, he might give you a good deal (hint).
On Thursdays and Fridays at 7pm he hosts these BYOB (or BYO-​wine) events. He provides the easels, paints, brushes, decent sized canvases, and everything else you could need. Plus I believe he sells/​serves coffee and espresso. The class lasts 2 – 3 hours. On his website, you can see which paintings he’ll teach you to paint. They look intimidating but he makes it look easy and you always leave with a great piece of art made by you!
On Wednesdays and Saturdays at 4pm, he hosts 2-​hour BYOB classes, they’re shorter and less expensive, but smaller canvases. I’d recommend the ones on Thursdays and Fridays.
He also has a brand new high tech giclee printer. For those that don’t know, this is basically a printer that can print anything on canvas and in a quality that most would genuinely think is an original painting. He can even do this with photographs in excellent quality on canvas… And at a great price.
He sometimes seems to go fairly quickly to keep pace, but he walks around and helps when it’s needed. If you need more time or help, just ask.
I went back tonight with my husband and it was like our own private class, with wine and plenty of laughs and smiles.
I’m planning on going back with a group of friends from my neighborhood. Trust me when I say we have no artistic abilities and can get a little silly at times, but we had a blast and were all pretty impressed with our final product. I highly recommend it!!!