The Community Makerspace and Sustainability Farm, is designed to be a collaborative environment where individuals of all skill levels can access state-of-the-art equipment, training programs, and a supportive community to bring their creative projects to life.
The facility aims to serve hobbyists, entrepreneurs, students, and professionals by providing the resources needed for prototyping, fabrication, and innovation.
The Mission:
To empower individuals not only with the tools and knowledge to turn ideas into reality, but also to educate and provide classes and lecture series by locals, educators, professionals, and those with a passion to share their knowledge with the community. By fostering a culture of learning, experimentation, and collaboration, I envision becoming a leading center for creative and technological advancement.
The makerspace will offer a range of membership plans, training workshops, and open access to fabrication tools such as Metal breaks, laser cutters, and CNC machines. Revenue will be generated through membership fees, specialized training programs, corporate partnerships, sponsored events, and other potential sources as opportunities arise. The financial plan outlines an initial investment covering equipment, facility setup, and operational expenses.
Potential funding sources include grants, private investors, and community/corporate sponsorships. The goal is to achieve financial sustainability within the first three years through a diversified revenue
model.
Students
Start-Ups
Corporate Memberships
And everyone else
Goals
- Workshop space for generic project work (Think workbenches with hand tools, vices, etc.) Specialized stations for applications like Soldering/Reflow, Paint Booths (or benches) Larger tables for projects that won’t fit on a standard work desk. Overhead electric ports on retractable cables.
- Storage space for patrons/clients, for the artists, robotics enthusiasts, bicycle repair people, etc. people who will want to work and store projects here till completion. Ranging from cubbies, to cabinets, a closet size space, to a basement like wire fenced off cubical area with a padlock. Various sizes = different rental costs.
- Office Style spaces for those who want to establish a longer term base of operation.
- Garage Bays with Lifts
- Space for lectures and classes, I really loved the Walker Lecture series on Wednesday nights at the Audi. A consistent lecture series on engineering, science, and technology, on a weekly basis would be fantastic with donation to support the lecturer and space.
- Computer Lab!
- Robotics Lab/Workshop, this area would have a test chamber per the NHRL specifications.
- Materials Store, Wood, plastics, paints, metal stock, hardware, electronics, components, etc. all stocked and ready for purchase (Discount for members as part of membership program.)
- Modular storage systems for workshop management
- Powder Coating, Painting Booths, General environmental hood type equipment.
Insight, Notes, Further Reading
https://www.hdrinc.com/insights/designing-how-we-learn-maker-spaces-and-instructional-laboratories
“Maker spaces are not intended to be used as a “teaching” environment; they are strictly a “learning” environment.” – I don’t agree with this point and there’s a chance that this leads my whole plan away from the concept of the “traditional” makerspace and I don’t mind that if that’s the case.
Waste
I have noticed that the volunteer structure is absolutely wonderful and collaborative but it does seem to lead to other spaces having an increased amount of wasteful spending and depreciated machines.
Money should be carefully and transparently spent of machines.
If a machine is out of the budget for the space, then I believe it is better to wait and get the highest quality machine possible than to seek the lowest cost machine to “get the job done”. So often I have seen people loose enthusiasm when the tool they finally got was more of a hinderance to the creative process than it was helping them create.