Wanna tuft? See inside new Macon rug art studio, a first for Middle Georgia

A new rug making art studio in downtown Macon, established by a Warner Robins native, hopes to bring a unique creative outlet for Middle Georgia residents.

Tonia Williams, 34, opened Wanna Tuft Studios as a part of Tanglewood Art Studios earlier this month. She took to the art form quickly, opening the business after a rug making class she attended in Atlanta this year motivated her to bring a unique business to Middle Georgia.

This community art studio specializes in teaching students of all ages how to create their own custom rugs using a process called tufting, where creatives use a gun loaded with yarn against mesh fabric to design their rug. The studio provides all the supplies and guidance. Students just bring their ideas.

“I’m still a kid at heart,” Williams said. “I love to have fun and have people bring themselves out of their shells.”

In many ways, the business brings Williams out of her shell as well.

Taking a chance on Macon

Williams has no formal art background, lives in McDonough and works as a conductor for the Norfolk Southern train company during the week. But she plans to come to Macon to support her first brick-and-mortar business and create a positive and creative space for the region that shaped her.

“People don’t want to take chances on cities like Macon. They always want to go to Atlanta, where it’s already thriving,” she said. “I just want people to really take a chance when somebody is taking a chance like myself to bring the creative out of Macon.”

The Tufting Process

Wanna Tuft Studios is located near downtown Macon off of Third Street. Williams co-owns the studio alongside her best friend of more than a decade Parrisha Simmons, who grew up in Macon.

The studio is open on weekends from Friday through Sunday. They offer one class on Friday from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. and two classes on Saturdays and Sundays.

The studio does not accept walk-ins and participants must sign up for tufting classes on the studio’s website ahead of time. Participants must be at least 11 years old to sign up for the class. The studio allows for up to 12 people to tuft in a class at one time in a three and a half hour time slot. All materials for the class are provided. Williams said the shop will serve snacks and water during classes, and they are aiming to serve alcohol in the future.

When signing up for class online, participants upload three potential designs for their rug. Williams said the pictures that translate best into rugs are two-dimensional images without excessive detail, texture or intricate lines. From there, Williams and her team project the most user-friendly design and sketch it onto the mesh fabric ahead of the start of class.

“You create what you want,” Williams said. “A lot of places … they want preselected designs. That’s cool and everything, but when you put something (together) that’s your own and you bring it to life, it’s a really good feeling.”

Standard pricing to tuft a 30-inch rug is $90, but Wanna Tuft Studios is running a promotion in September and discounting tufting classes to $78. Participants also can make a 22-inch rug for $55. Williams said she’s willing to adjust prices on the rugs to meet the interest in the community, but it’s a balancing act between keeping the price low for customers and not lowballing herself.

Since opening, Williams has shared a wide variety of rug designs made by class attendees on the studio’s social media. They’ve included everything from sports team logos to the face of a pet.

After participants finish their design and the class ends, the studio staff will glue the back and let the rug dry. They will then clean up the design by shearing the rug, cutting the design out of the mesh and adding a back. Within a week, participants can come by the studio to pick up their finished rug or have the rug shipped to them for a small fee.

Since the studio opened, Williams said she has constantly brainstormed new ideas that might draw people to the studio, including themed tufting nights. Class attendees can tuft a rug of their pet on Sept. 27 or can come for a date night for the “Two People on One Rug” class on Sept. 26. She envisions all kinds of groups coming to the studio, from birthday parties to businesses wanting to work on team building.

Rug tufting is the primary focus of the studio, but Williams said she also hosts drip bear painting classes. Students mix different paint colors in a plastic cup and pour the combination over a nine-inch ceramic bear-shaped piggy bank to create a tie-dye or marble design.

The drip bear classes cost $20 per person and include a small bear keychain. Williams said she arranged the schedule for people to work on one class or the other and will have rug tufting classes and drip bear painting classes staggered throughout the weekend.

Williams’ journey to better herself, her community

Williams excelled athletically growing up and served in law enforcement, but spent four years in prison after a drug-related conviction. Her journey has led her to want to help others.

As a teenager in Warner Robins, Williams excelled in high school basketball at Houston County High School and was recruited to play in college at the University of South Carolina, according to her team profile. Williams said she then transferred to West Virginia University, where she studied criminology in college with a dream of working for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Her criminology degree led her to begin working right out of college for the Georgia Department of Corrections, where Williams said she worked for two years. While Williams served as an early career correctional officer, the FBI conducted an undercover sting operation to investigate episodes of corruption inside GDC facilities, especially involving contraband such as drugs and cell phones.

Through a string of other correctional officers, Williams said someone approached her about joining the operation to move drugs and recruit other officers to help drive drugs outside of the prisons. She initially said no, but eventually became involved.

“I was getting paid like $24,000 a year and I’m risking my life every day. Like I’ve almost been stabbed, you know?” Williams said. “I was young, 22, and it seemed like I wasn’t hurting anybody … because I’m not bringing (drugs) inside the prison.”

Williams said she was only part of the operation for three weeks before she quit her job and joined the military. After a year living in Washington, D.C., and serving in the Air Force Honor Guard, Williams was arrested for her involvement in the operation inside GDC facilities.

In 2016, a federal grand jury indicted Williams and 49 other current and former correctional officers for their involvement, according to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Northern District of Georgia. Prosecutors said she was charged with accepting bribe payments to protect drug transactions and attempted drug trafficking.

She pleaded guilty to attempted drug distribution, according to court records, and was sentenced to five years in federal prison, but was released after four.

During her time in prison, Williams started writing about her experience in what would eventually become a self-published book entitled “From Blue to Brown,” which she penned in a way to help people learn from her path. She wrote the majority of the book over the course of two months and finished it when she was released in 2022.

“It’s bittersweet because when I was away, I became a better person. I became in touch with myself. … It made me want to help people more,” Williams said. “But it sucked though, because I was 27 when I went in and came out 31 and so sometimes I feel like I missed my prime.”

Once she was released, Williams started figuring out what her next steps were. She began working for Norfolk Southern as a conductor, but felt that there was more she could do.

“When I was in (prison), I was like ‘How am I going to better myself and how am I going to better my community?’ It’s not going to be (just) working a nine-to-five,” she said.

Williams has aspirations to use Wanna Tuft Studios as a vehicle to give back to the community in the near future. In October and January, the studio plans to host “Bears for the Boys & Girls Club Central Georgia,” where a portion of the proceeds from the class will go to the club.

“This is not something that I’m doing to just make money,” she said. “I want to have other people make money, hire people, and give things out.”

In a similar way to how Williams feels she’s taking a chance on bringing her business back home to Middle Georgia, she hopes that people will take a chance on her. Williams’ path serves as an example that it doesn’t take an expert in a field to start over and start something new, but just a matter of taking the first step.

This story was originally published September 11, 2025 at 6:00 AM.