Outside the Box Creation Review – October 2024

Outside the Box Creation is a subscription box that brings art class into your home! Each month, ignite your child's creativity with fresh art techniques to explore through a box that has been crafted by professional Art Educators and Literacy Experts. Dive into each month's curriculum delivery, complete with designed lesson plans and high quality art materials, empowering your student to craft a masterpiece. Geared towards kids ages 5-11, you can even choose the size of the kit so it fits the needs of your family!

The Cost: Subscriptions start at $36.95 each month + shipping. Save on longer subscriptions!

This is a review of the art box designed for up to two kiddos.

(Check out our editorial guidelines to learn more about how we review boxes.)

First Impressions

I have worked in the public education system for more than 5 years now, and have two little boys that attend said school. While I do feel they are getting adequately educated, as a lover or learning, I am always on the hunt for ways to incorporate just a little more at home. This is our third go around with the Outside the Box Creation, and I found the curriculum in this box and projects to be very thoughtfully laid out, and the supplies high quality. Read below to see how this month's projects turned out.

Straight out of the gate, I am loving the size of this box! At almost fourteen inches long, and 9 inches wide, this is one of the larger subscription boxes I receive, so I couldn't wait to see what goodies were packed inside! Containing everything we needed for this month's projects, Charlie was really excited to dig in.

Artist Guide

Because this subscription is meant to be utilized as art curriculum, we have been provided with an Artist Guide. This fourteen page book features learning objectives, tips for grown ups, content lists, digital pairings, lessons, examples, and even games! Put together in a user friendly way, this guide does a fabulous job of teaching us techniques, all while adding history, facts, and fun to art!

Not feeling so swell, but Charlie was still excited to work on the "Abstract Expressionism" art unit!

Art Supplies

Acrylic Paint Set

The first item we pulled out of this month's box was this set of black and white acrylic paint. Charlie LOVES painting, so he was really excited. The tubes are large and contain 75mL of paint each. This amount is plenty for all of this month's activities, plus many more. Charlie was curious though, why the paint bottles say "Acrylic Paint Glitter" when there was clearly no glitter in the paint. Odd indeed, I'm not sure either, but we really were happy to add these basic colors of paint to our craft cabinet for future use!

Worison Woodless Charcoal Pencils 3 Piece - $0.98

Charlie has worked with charcoal before, in helping me with my SketchBox reviews but he really liked these pencil type variations better than the actual charcoal sticks. (I do too, those sticks are suuuuuuuper messy!) With a soft, medium, and hard pencil, these created different gradients on one of our activities, and are great for adding details. Charlie was definitely happy to have his very own charcoal pencils, and has put them in his own special box to create with later.

Crayons and Paintbrushes

I love the fact that this box sends absolutely everything you need to complete the activities in this box. I literally had to do no planning, no rounding up supplies, no nothing! Even including crayons and paintbrushes, this box has it all! The crayons had a nice color to them, and the paintbrushes worked as expected.

Painting Canvas X 2

While Charlie does like creating artwork on paper, he gets extra excited when he has an opportunity to create on canvas, as it feels so much more professional! This month we received two canvas panels and two plastic cups for water. Seriously - they have everything in this box!!

We're Going on a Goon Hunt - Retail Value $16.99

One of the last "physical" supplies we received was this book. Charlie loves to read, and now that his school is counting reading minutes instead of AR points, the opportunities are endless! My poor little guy has been sick for the last few days, so his day was made a little brighter when he received this book to read when lounging on the couch. A parody of the Going on a Bear Hunt book, Charlie liked the spooky aspect since Halloween is right around the corner. We actually own the "Goodnight Goon" parody book in this series already, so we had a fun little reading time! Not only did we receive a book, but also a reflection in the artist guide with an area to answer questions, a grayscale art challenge, AND a self analysis! Awesome!

Poor little buddy - sick days stink, but fun books definitely make them better! ❤️

Paper Supplies

Also included in this month's kit were two charcoal sheets, two paint sheets, a ton of blank paper copies, and two large sheets of brown paper to keep surfaces clean.

Adventure #1

For our very first lesson, we learned all about some important terms before jumping in. Charlie was able to define monochromatic, abstract expressionism, sgraffito, acrylic wash, and grayscale after going through this glossary. A great way to start this fun unit, we moved on to the practicing portion of this adventure. Here we practiced creating grayscale with charcoal and with paint. This helped develop an understanding of abstract expressionism. Also included in this adventure was a photo of the painting Soft Night by Arshile Gorky. We reflected and discussed what shapes we saw, where the lightest and darkest parts are, what makes the painting expressive, and the emotions.

Charlie loved using the charcoal pencils to create the gradients. His favorite was obviously the darkest black with the soft pencil, but he had a really fun time color matching. Painting was his fave - mixing was really intriguing to him, and he really enjoyed incorporating the words "monochromatic, grayscale, and value" during his work. A great start to this month's activities!

Adventure #2

The next adventure we went on was one that used paint to create organic shapes in grayscale while using crayons to create pops of color in an abstract expressionist type. This was done with a piece of paper folded into fourths, then colored with the crayons. Each rectangular box representing a different color. After 2-3 of the shapes were colored in, we went ahead and painted with different greyscale shades. This activity also included some extended learning. Not only did we receive the Grayscale Color Study, but we also were given instructions for five other activities such as an outdoor color scavenger hunt, cloud watching and sketching, shadow art exploration, texture rubbing and painting, and abstract nature collages. Since Charlie was sick, so we didn't get to do too much extra, but did do the shadow art exploration in his room one evening to try and cheer him up a bit.

This might have been my favorite activity, just because I liked using the variety of mediums. Charlie had a really fun time with this color study and definitely appreciated the open-mindedness of this activity. Overall, I think these turned out really cool, and because we have so many supplies, might just do this again!

Adventure #3

The next technique we learned about was sgraffito. This technique incorporated carving designs into the paint. Charlie was thrilled to get to use more paint, and really enjoyed creating abstract art based on his feelings.

Even though Charlie wasn't feeling 100% the day he did this project, he did a great job. I love how different our pictures look, and appreciate the creative process that landed us to our finished projects. This one was matted and hung on the refrigerator to enjoy!

Lesson #4

The last lesson was where the canvas panel came into play. This adventure included a landscape with acrylic wash. After reviewing the well laid out instructions, Charlie was able to sketch a landscape enhanced with grayscale techniques, create an acrylic wash, and add details with charcoal on top.

To start this project, Charlie sketched out his mountains, and followed that with an acrylic wash. He didn't quite get the wash as soft as he was wanted, but I think it turned out really nice. He went back to add some charcoal, and has now placed it in his room. What a fun box!

Was This Box Worth It?

The Cost: $36.95 + Shipping

This was our third go around with the Outside Creation Box and both Charlie and I were impressed. This box contains enough supplies for two people, so it works wonderfully for a mother/son duo. We went through the entire unit trying out the new techniques and learning new vocabulary along the way. Not only were we impressed by the activities, but we also loved the inclusion of the book. Charlie doesn't have art class at school this year, so using this as an at-home curriculum is a great fit that we both enjoy. Though a little on the spendy side, I feel this subscription is worth it for the amount of knowledge you get out of it. The physical items weren't as high of a value as last times, but the Artist Guide is definitely key to making this box work. My son was extremely engaged throughout these lessons, and we really bonded through this experience, all without any prep on my part. Overall, I am really impressed and can't wait to see what we discover next month!

More You Should Know

Can you still get this box if you sign up today? Possibly. Each month the boxes ship out on or around the 7th. If they still have boxes in stock, you will receive that box.

What do you think about Outside Creation Box?