Where sculpture, paint, clay, and wood come together in one remarkable small town
Long before Laurel became synonymous with HGTV and home renovation, it was a city shaped by craftsmen. The timber barons who built her wide boulevards and Craftsman bungalows did so with an eye toward beauty as much as function, and that instinct never really left. Today, Laurel is home to a quietly remarkable cluster of working artists: a sculptor whose corten steel figures have landed in public collections across the country, a painter whose raccoons and dandelions have taken on a life of their own, a potter who turns raw clay into community in a converted studio off Sawmill Road, and a woodworker-turned-television-star who made the whole world fall in love with this place. This is not a curated arts district with velvet ropes and wine hours. It's something more interesting, a real creative town, still doing the work.
Jason Kimes | Sculptor
You can find Jason Kimes’s work in two places around Laurel: a sculpture on temporary exhibit in a downtown roundabout, and permanent pieces in the collection of the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art. Either way, the encounter is arresting—Kimes’s sculptures have always been about the human figure in motion. Working primarily in welded Corten steel and stainless, Kimes builds large-scale works that feel both industrial and deeply personal: a walking figure nearly eight feet tall, a nine-foot sphere fashioned from 11,000 interlocking stainless rings, a series of hand forms that seem to reach, grasp, and release all at once.
His portfolio spans decades and scales, from intimate cast epoxy pieces to monumental public installations. A Deepwater Horizon memorial standing 27 feet wide speaks to the range of what Kimes will take on when the subject demands it. Recent work includes Veni, Vidi, Vici (2025), a three-part series that moves between cast epoxy, welded corten, and stainless steel. His studio is rooted in Laurel, and his presence here is part of what makes the town's creative identity feel earned rather than manufactured.
Adam Trest | Painter
If you've spent any time in Laurel, or in the orbit of Erin Napier's Instagram, you already know Adam Trest's work, even if you don't know you know it. His paintings of birds, botanicals, and what he calls his "bandits" (raccoons, opossums, armadillos, squirrels, the creatures most people treat as nuisances) have become one of the defining visual languages of this town. His studio is in downtown Laurel, and his work is woven into Trustmark Art Park itself—printed on banners and the park’s fencing—as warm and slightly chaotic as the paintings suggest.
Trest's newest collection leans fully into the bandits, a celebration of the overlooked and underestimated that reads, in his words, as a love letter to "the undesirables." He's also deep in collaboration with Erin Napier on The Christmas House, a children's book due from Baker Book House Publishing in September 2026, a follow-up to the pair's previous collaborations that have introduced his aesthetic to a national audience of readers well beyond the art world.
What makes Trest's work so resonant isn't just the charm of the subject matter, it's the commitment. He paints Mississippi the way it actually looks and feels: overgrown, alive, a little raucous, and completely beautiful. His prints, originals, canvas works, fabric collaborations, wallpaper, and ceramics are available through his online studio shop.
Jeremy Brooke | Bullfrog Pottery
On Sawmill Road, in a studio that has quietly become one of Laurel's most welcoming creative spaces, Jeremy Brooke has been making pottery and making community in equal measure. Bullfrog Pottery is part working studio, part classroom, offering hands-on classes for adults and kids, custom orders, and the kind of unpretentious creative energy that makes people want to come back.
Brooke keeps things grounded and local. His work spans functional ceramics and decorative pieces, and his classes range from adult sessions to kids' workshops (his Easter Bunny class each spring tends to fill up fast). The studio is a genuine gathering place, the kind of spot that exists in every great creative town and is usually the last thing visitors think to look for and the first thing they tell people about when they get home.
Bullfrog Pottery is located at 422 Sawmill Road, Laurel, MS 39440. Classes can be booked online, and custom orders are always welcome.
bullfrogpotteryms.com | (601) 434-6538
Ben Napier | Woodworker
The co-host of HGTV's Home Town (the highest-rated pilot in the network's history) has spent years championing the idea that handcraft and small-town life aren't consolation prizes. They're the thing.
Napier's Scotsman General Store & Woodshop on Laurel's railroad corridor is both a retail destination and a working shop. A viewing window in the General Store lets visitors watch custom pieces being built by hand, many of them destined for Home Town renovation reveals. His work emphasizes local and reclaimed materials, and his wooden cutting boards have become something of an icon at this point: simple, durable, made right here.
The Napiers' broader creative footprint in Laurel, Scotsman, Laurel Mercantile, and the Scent Library has served as the scaffolding for the town's tourism renaissance. But the woodshop is where Ben's actual identity as a craftsman lives, and it's worth a stop for that alone.
Scotsman General Store & Woodshop | Downtown Laurel
Laura Jones | Painter
Laura Jones grew up in downtown Laurel, spending summers at art camp and weekends walking to the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art—the institution she credits with shaping her artistic identity. Today the Laurel-based painter is building a career around a simple but profound idea: places matter. Whether it’s a family church, a blooming garden, or the transitional landscapes of a beloved film, her work asks viewers to pay closer attention to the backgrounds of their own lives.
Jones works in both watercolor and acrylic, and her commissions have become something of a Laurel institution: custom watercolor churches for wedding invitations, hand-painted invitation suites, stationery, and crests that couples and families keep as heirlooms. Her recent Pride & Prejudice collection—inspired by the 2005 film, pausing on the estates and landscapes rather than the characters—brought her work to a wider audience, as did appearances on HGTV’s Home Town. She also teaches watercolor classes through the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art.
The Lauren Rogers Museum of Art
No tour of Laurel's creative community would be complete without the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, the oldest art museum in Mississippi, one block from downtown, and a world-class institution quietly doing its thing in a town of 17,000. The permanent collection spans Native American basketry, Japanese woodblock prints, American and European paintings, and Georgian silver. Rotating exhibitions, artist workshops, and education programs make it a living part of the community, not just a monument to it.
Caron Gallery
For visitors who want to take something home, Caron Gallery represents approximately 50 Mississippi artists working across mediums, abstracts, folk art, sculpture, jewelry, glass, ceramics, and traditional and contemporary landscapes. It's one of the best places in the state to survey the breadth of what Mississippi artists are making right now.
Novi Creations | Handmade Jewelry
For handcrafted jewelry made with genuine artistry, Novi Creations is worth seeking out. The pieces are handmade and unmistakably individual—the kind of work that makes for a more meaningful souvenir than anything mass-produced, and the kind of find that makes visitors feel like they’ve discovered something the guidebooks haven’t caught up to yet.
Plan Your Visit
Laurel's creative community isn't spread across a county; most of it is walkable from downtown. Trustmark Art Park, Adam Trest's studio, the Scotsman Woodshop, Caron Gallery, and the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art form a loose creative corridor that rewards a slow afternoon. Bullfrog Pottery on Sawmill Road is a quick drive and worth building into any itinerary. Don’t miss the murals woven throughout downtown either—the self-guided mural tour at visitjones.com is a great way to see them all at your own pace.
If you're planning a trip, visitjones.com has self-guided tours, event calendars, and everything you need to make the most of Laurel, a town that was always this interesting and is only now getting the attention it deserves.
