Cheryl Watts Pottery & Gallery — Attraction in Monterey

I came here on a whim, and it ruined my entire birthday.

Initially it was cute, a quaint little shop with a mixed bag of art. I was surprised to find a case with some antique jewelry, and a gold locket caught my eye. I asked to inspect it closer, and the lady working said, "That's $100. I can take it out, but I'll have to move everything to get to it. Are you actually thinking about buying?" Why else would I ask to see it? I was appalled, first there were only two paintings she had to move. Second, it was marked at $30, but even if it was $100, so what? It's Monterey bay, do you think I can't afford it?

I was honestly shocked by how rude she was. This is the second time someone remarked about my ability to afford something, both times I wasn't wearing a wig. (I have cancer, and my hair has fallen out, so I'm bald now.) Even if I was poor, or looked that way, I wouldn't have deserved being treated that way. My sister and I left the store.

But that's not all! She chased us down the street, said it was the wrong price, and that it was only $30. To her credit, she offered to give me a discount. I was still confused: you're telling me that you wouldn't move all that stuff for a $100 sale? But you would for a (now with a discount) $15 sale? Now that you think I could afford it?

I went to look at the locket, but at that point I just felt sick to my stomach and wanted to go home. I don't know if it was the owner, or if it was an employee, but I won't be...

Visited on Sun 9/21 because we just moved to the area & have been looking to buy some art for our new home. This gallery definitely has tons of pieces but the women working that day seemed to have a bad attitude. The works are mostly displayed in piles, like maybe 10-20 canvases stacked on top of each other all over the store, so you can't really see everything that's available, and it's just laid out all over. I asked politely if the gallery had any kind of website/ online catalogue of the available works or artists, and the woman gave a snarky reply like "You're here aren't you? Why not just look around you" as if there wasn't probably thousands of items stacked in piles in that room. I'm not sure if the attitude was because I was dressed casually and she didn't take me seriously, or thought I was an annoying tourist, or what the case was, but it just felt like poor customer service and rather dismissive. Shouldn't you want people to buy the artwork? Shouldn't you make it as easy as possible? Due to the unorganized atmosphere and snarky attitude causing a bad experience, I definitely wouldn't recommend...

A must visit if you want to get a piece of art to commemorate your visit to Monterey. It was incredible to walk around a room filled to the brim with beautiful pieces, thumbing through stacks of gorgeous watercolor, acrylic, and oil pieces.

The curator and owner has had this gallery for over 30 years, and her experience shows! She is knowledgeable about her gallery, artists, and individual pieces.

We told her a couple things we were looking for (impressionist, water on rocks, beaches) and she began pulling pieces for us to look at. She was able to quickly get a feel for what we did and did not like, and she kept pulling better and better suggestions for us. She was able to pull out pieces that we instantly fell in love with.

Once we had a set of pieces, she was able to make a deal for all of the works which we found very reasonable. We were able to buy 6 pieces of art for under $500 that we were very happy with. Cheryl then packaged all of our pieces together very thoroughly so we could safely carry them on to our flight home.

All in all a wonderful art buying experience. I cannot recommend this...