Laguna College of Art + Design

What LCAD is

Laguna College of Art + Design is a nonprofit college of art and design in Laguna Canyon. It grants degrees in the arts, and its website lists eight undergraduate majors, two graduate programs and 13 minors. This page is about the parts of the college that visitors and neighbors can use: its gallery, its public classes, its events and its campus. It is not an admissions guide, and the college’s own admissions pages answer those questions.

The LCAD Gallery

LCAD’s public gallery is not on the canyon campus. It is at 374 Ocean Avenue. Other galleries are listed on the art galleries page. LCAD lists the hours as 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday, closed Monday and Tuesday, and says admission is always free. The college says the exhibitions follow the educational and creative aims of its majors and are meant to widen community appreciation of different art forms.

In October 2026 the gallery showed Subversive Encryptions, which runs from October 1 to November 15. Earlier this fall it held The Art of LCAD Animation (September 3 to 20) and, in August, the 15th Annual Laguna Bluebelt Photo Exhibition (August 6 to 16). The exhibitions page listed nothing after Subversive Encryptions, so check it for the next show. The gallery page lists (949) 376-6000, extension 289.

First Thursdays bring extended hours to many other galleries; the Art Walk page explains that evening.

Classes open to the public

The college runs community education that it describes as open to the public, short-term and not for credit. For fall 2026 it listed painting courses on Saturdays, short pose workshops on Saturdays through December 19 and long pose workshops on Friday evenings through December 11. The long pose sessions are drop-in: $15 a session as of October 2026, no registration, ages 16 and up. LCAD students, faculty, staff and alumni attend free with ID. Dates, tuition and studios are on the art classes page.

LCAD also lists a pre-college program. Its summer 2026 listing ran four weeks from July 6 to July 30, Monday through Thursday, with courses that can earn transferable college credit and tuition of $1,200. The listing is for prospective students; for other youth options see camps and youth programs.

Events and talks

LCAD’s events page lists gallery opening receptions (the October 1 reception for Subversive Encryptions ran 6 to 9 p.m.), a fall open house and two National Portfolio Day events in November. It also names the Creativity Flow Speaker Series, which LCAD presents with Group Y. LCAD says the series unites leaders across art, design and commerce, and the series page posts full videos of past talks. The events page says the series will return soon and lists no dates, and the series page does not say whether the public can attend, so confirm with the college before you plan around one.

The campus on Laguna Canyon Road

The main campus is at 2222 Laguna Canyon Road, with a phone number of (949) 376-6000. The college’s site menu lists campus pages for the Administration Building, Big Bend, the Main Campus, the MFA Fine Art Studios, the Residence Hall, the Suzanne Chonette Senior Studios and the Fabrication Lab. It offers campus tours for prospective BFA students by appointment, and the pages read for this guide say nothing about general public access or parking, so call ahead if you plan to visit a class or workshop. The campus sits in the Laguna Canyon area.

History as LCAD tells it

According to the college, it began in 1961 as the Laguna Beach School of Art, a nonprofit art college, and incorporated as a not-for-profit in 1966. Nellie Gail Moulton was one of the founding members. In 1975 the college bought 3.4 acres in Laguna Canyon from the Irvine Company, and in 1977 it moved from the Festival of Arts grounds to 2222 Laguna Canyon Road.

The name changed twice: the Art Institute of Southern California in 1985, then Laguna College of Art and Design in 2002. It received its first NASAD accreditation as a four-year college granting the BFA in 1987 and graduated its first BFA class, 15 students, in 1990. It launched an MFA in Drawing and Painting in 2006 and bought the Big Bend site at 2825 Laguna Canyon Road in 2016. For the wider story of how the art colony began, read Laguna Beach history.