Signs of UK Co-operative and Open-Access workshops

I have been a little quiet lately but that doesn't mean that I haven't been productive in my research.

I located a pay-as-you go workshop in London. Based in Acton, 'MakingRoom' looks rather good. The website gallery depicts and large and modern carpentry workshop that is available for use at prices starting from £90 per day. The bias certainly seems to be towards wood working and hence I don't think there is any opportunity for the milling of metal, welding, 3D printing etc. Furthermore the price is quite steep for casual non-commercial users. However it is promising that such endeavours have already sprouted on this side of the Atlantic.

With these discoveries in mind I thought it worth continuing my exploration of London based workshop facilities. I recently returned to the message boards and posted requests for information regarding UK based co-operative and open-access workshop facilities to both dorkbotlondon and Makezine forums. From the start I haven't expected the Makezine post to yield much information as it is - as you would expect - US centric. And why not, I'm rather impressed with the organization of the US Maker movement.

However, I hoped that dorkbotlondon has it's collective finger on the pulse of London and so far it hasn't been a total disappointment. A couple of members have responded to me and one made me aware of the SomethingLabs studio in Bethnal Green. Along with desk rental the space includes an 'occasional use' workshop. I have sent along an inquiry to find out whether they'd be supportive of projects with an engineering and workshop bias. Interestingly one of SomethingLabs residents is Tinker.it - a European distributor of the Arduino platform.

On a related note I'd like to see the UK circulation statistics for Make magazine in UK regions to get an idea on the size and distribution of the UK Maker community. Last time I looked, Make was on sale in WHSmiths, so along with 'Canal Boat' it's apparently gone mainstream in England - another good sign for UK Makers. Incidentally - I do like canals and canal boats although I have never bought the publication ;-)

My next steps will be to check out what kind of workshop spaces are available to rent in London although I'm quite certain they'll be out of this individuals price range...

TechShop review

I found a good review of TechShop here. They really seem to have a nice workshop with some very cool tools - if only they'd open one in Hackney so that I could build a robot army!

UK Maker scene

These past few days I've been trying to distill my ideas for an urban communal engineering workshop. I've uncovered a little bit more information regarding the Maker scene in the UK and while it's not exactly as burgeoning as that in the US, it's certainly established. My web wanderings first lead me to the Make forums where I became quickly impressed and then rapidly jealous of the stateside Maker Faires. These events bring together like minded people for home brew technology demos, workshops, and exhibitions in an informal fun setting - a fairground! Why can't there be something like this in the UK? Well it turns out there is...

In one particular Make forum thread there was two year year long gripe by UK Makers about the lack of UK based meetings like the stateside Maker Faires. This was the first indication that there are UK Makers out there. But more importantly one of the posts referred to the London branch of dorkbot as a possible alternative. I had heard of dorkbot many years ago - probably when I was reading NTK which I believe is an affiliate. The group states that if consists of 'People doing strange things with electricity' and brings together artists, engineers, and geeks for creative endeavours. The group seems to have been running for seven years now and they've had over 55 meetings - so I feel particularly foolish for not getting involved earlier on.

Aside for the monthly city meets dorkbotlondon is this year holding DorkCamp2008 - that seems to be a small scale event similar to a Maker Faire - at a campsite in Dorking (hehe). This is the third year the camp has been running and the initial schedule looks pretty cool. However, due to prior commitments I won't be able to attend this year :-(

Anyway, I've been reasonably encouraged by my findings and will certainly try to make it along to the next dorkbotlondon meet in August. Hopefully this means that there will be some other London based individuals who might like to get together to use a London based shared engineering workshop - like TechShop but on a [much] smaller scale.

TechShop

Recently I described my wish for an inner city community based workshop resource. This would enable those of us living in limited city abodes to get workshop time on some cool machinery and thus exercise some creativity. Well it looks like something similar is already advancing well in the US and on a typically American scale too. TechShop offers its members shop-time on a wide range of equipment on a subscription basis. Furthermore it also offers classes and training to ensure that tools are used safely.

The range of the equipment is impressive and includes tools for automotive repairs, laser etching, plasma cutting, electronic engineering, and sheet metal work. Access to tools can be booked and memberships are managed with RFID tags. Memberships are reasonably priced at around £600 a year - which I personally think is pretty good - I'd rather join TechShop than some Soho members club!

The question is: When will TechShop cross the Atlantic?