Tiny toys on fishing wire hang down from the ceiling.
The cash register has a small fortune from a fortune cookie taped to the front of it that reads, "You love Chinese food."
Tucked away in Kresge Art Center, the Spartan Art Store, also known as the Kresge Art Store, has been a crucial part of art students' lives since 1969.
Much like an MSU book store sells everything a student could need, the Kresge Art Store sells almost everything artistic, from canvas to paints to sketch pads.
"They have most everything you'll need for class in stock," art education senior Arielle Popkey said.
Popkey said she comes into the store a few times every day and gets coffee every morning.
Last year, she bought her roommates toys from the store for a gift exchange, Popkey said. "I wrapped it with the Jesus wrapping paper from here," said Popkey, referring to the colorful wrapping paper the store sells.
Trinkets such as an ear-shaped pencil sharpener for 75 cents, or a plastic cockroach for 20 cents, are what store clerk Kate Lewis said students often buy on impulse.
"(The store) is a little quirky with all the weird toys," the studio art and English senior said. "It suits the artistic community more than a traditional bookstore would."
The price of coffee drops to only 10 cents per cup for the last 15 minutes of every day, so there is usually a rush of people, Lewis said. The idea behind the cheap coffee is so that it doesn't go to waste — and the fee just pays for the cup.
At one time, students had to drive as far as Detroit and Flint to get the rarer art supplies, said Professor James Lawton, who started the store with the chairperson of the art department, Erling Brauner, more than 30 years ago. Lawton said he had seen art stores at other U.S. colleges and thought it would be beneficial to have one at MSU.
He originally started the store because of the lack of casting metals. Students couldn't get them from smelting companies unless they ordered hundreds of pounds in metals, he said.
"It's evolved to be a very beneficial and extremely important part of the department," Lawton said. "Artists work with materials, and whatever you can do to get them to the student is beneficial."
About 95 percent of the store's customers are art students, manager Casey Sorrow said.
The store is owned by the Nebraska Book Company, which also owns the Spartan Bookstore in the International Center. Despite being owned by a corporation, Sorrow said the store tries to keep itself kitschy and homemade.
The store has an interesting history — at one point, it was robbed of just three cans of black ink, Sorrow said.
"Of all the things to steal, it seems pretty odd," Sorrow said.
Eighty percent of the store's sales are art supplies and the other 20 percent of sales is in soda, food and toys, Sorrow said. About 70 people come in every day — and many of them stop in more than once a day, he said.
"A lot of times you feel like the bartender of the art department because people ask for advice on classes, art supplies," Sorrow said. "It's the greatest part of the job."
