In the corner of Flora Bodega, a grocery store in Oklahoma City’s Paseo District, there is a shelf crammed with art supplies: paper, quilting materials, crayons and paints. This shelf is the realization of a years-long dream for Lexi Rodriguez.

Rodriguez said she started the art supply closet almost two years ago out of a desire to break down barriers when it comes to art accessibility. 

Rodriguez earned a bachelor’s in fine arts from the University of Central Oklahoma, with an emphasis in ceramics, and worked at the Melton Gallery for almost three years. When she noticed that art students often threw away supplies they no longer needed, the idea of the art closet began to form. 

“I just kind of wanted to help offset some of that waste,” Rodriguez said. 

When Rodriguez was ready to make the art supply closet a reality, Flora Bodega came to mind due to its free community fridge. This is outside the store and available 24/7 for people to either donate or take food. 

“I figured if they wanted to help people access food they would probably feel good about helping people access art supplies as well,” Rodriguez said. “The owner was really enthusiastic and really kind about sharing her space with me.” 

Rodriguez said her only obstacle when starting the closet was gathering supplies. The first few donation drops were mostly from friends. 

“They were incredible and very encouraging in getting this off the ground,” Rodriguez said. “But it did take a couple of months to actually get my idea in motion.” 

Rodriguez said it took about six months for word to get out to the community about the art supply closet, but that the response has been “overwhelmingly positive.” 

“People are excited about it, especially I’ve noticed just from DMs to the Instagram. Artists are really excited about it because they have a place to either find new supplies or take supplies that they no longer use,” Rodriguez said. 

Rodriguez said that teachers have also benefited from the closet. 

“Especially when there’s a large pencil, crayon and marker drop-off donation. A lot of people benefit from it, and that was just kind of the goal of the closet, is just anybody who needs it can have access to those resources.”

The closet has no limit on what can be taken. 

“It’s just kind of like if you see something you want, you can take it. If you need a few things, take it. That’s what it’s there for,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez said that the community has been considerate when taking items from the closet. 

“I don’t think that anyone’s ever gone in and cleared out everything from the closet,” Rodriguez said. 

Rodriguez said that some of the most popular items taken from the closet are paper, sketchpads, paint and construction paper. 

“We’ve had easel donations. Those went really, really fast. Then we have a lot of textile donations, so yarn and stuff like that, and that tends to go pretty quickly,” Rodriguez said. 

The closet does not accept toxic materials or unfinished projects. 

“There are some art supplies, like certain oil paints and solvents, that we can’t accept either,” Rodriguez said. “We don’t want people who aren’t old enough to handle those things to get access to those.” 

According to Rodriguez, those wishing to donate to the closet can simply walk in and drop off their supplies. Rodriguez said the staff at Flora Bodega are “really great,” about helping donors. 

“The only thing we ask is if you have a large donation, just to shoot us a DM and we can come pick it up and store it,” Rodriguez said. “The closet itself is pretty small.” 

Rodriguez said she has many “hopes and dreams” for the closet’s future, including one day making it into a nonprofit with its own space and community studio spaces for artists. 

“After about a year of the closet being sustainable and used by the community, I thought it would be really neat to hopefully one day be able to achieve nonprofit status,” Rodriguez said. “I’m honestly not trying to rush into that. I’m trying to take it as slow as humanly possible because I know there’s a lot of legal aspects. If I go nonprofit, there are things that need to change with the closet most likely.”