Imagine a place where you can do anything. Where with a little time, a little imagination, and a little training, you can make your dreams come true. That list of things you have always wanted to try? You can start checking them off one by one.
You have had those ideas. Those holy cow ideas, like an automated recipe creator, which takes everything you need for tonight’s dinner and puts it right at the front of the fridge or the cupboard. The fun ideas, like creating a chew toy for your dog that looks like your mother-in-law. The simple ideas. The extravagant ones. The ‘what ifs’. Humans are idea machines. It is our very nature to create things that improve the world we live in.
Most of the time, those ideas stay in our heads. A nice dream that is held back by one of five things; Money, Time, Access, Training, and Space. We have busy lives, full of jobs, or kids, or school, or meetings. Sometimes all of them. There are family events, and laundry, and Netflix. So many simple reasons to push aside that little sense of dissatisfaction that you feel right now.
You feel it, right? That you could do something that would bring you more satisfaction than beating the next level on Candy Crush. You ignore it, just like you are ignoring the fact that you are breathing right now. That your tongue is on the roof of your mouth. That you can always see your nose. It has become such a part of just existing, that you don’t even realize it is there. Except now, you are aware of all of those things. You’re welcome.
Sometimes there is an outlet for those ideas. Blogging, journals, sketchpads… but even if you get the ideas out, many times you don’t know where to start to create. And if you know where to start, many times you don’t have the tools, or the knowledge. You don’t have the help, and the space, and the community that supports your ideas and helps you to bring them to life.
For most of my life, I was exactly like that. I was full of ideas, and had not found the ambition, or the knowledge, or the space. I did not know where to start, so I did not start at all. And that is one of the reasons I started the Iowa City Fab Lab. Â
The Iowa City Fab Lab has been open for nearly a decade in its current location. Near downtown Iowa City, it is a place that I have worked hard at to make a space where making is possible. A Fab Lab, or Fabrication Laboratory, is simple in concept; gather all the tools so that you can make almost anything. There are over 1000 Fab Labs worldwide. Some small, some large, but all with the same goal. To make everyone able to create their dreams.
We have created a wonderful space! A place with a full wood shop, sewing center, classrooms, and a computer lab, and so much more. The things that people have needed for the last half century to get stuff done. 8000 square feet of awesome. The Fab Lab is a place that anyone can access, to learn to use the equipment, to have the space to make their ideas a reality.
We did not stop there, though. We also have 3D printing, and laser cutting, and a framing studio. We have stained glass and vinyl cutting. We have a ceramics studio and have robotics and electronics equipment. We have a metal lathe, a wood lathe, a jointer, a planer, and a slab flattener, and all the software needed to run all those amazing pieces of equipment.
But even with all this equipment, and all the space to hold it, there is something that is missing. The most important part. It is the whole reason that humans can create such wonders in the first place. That something that is missing is very simple. That something missing is you.
Humans are herd creatures. We are all individuals who want to be with other individuals. Some species thrive on being alone. Tigers. Lions. Bears. Oh my. Some animals find comfort in anonymity. Schools of fish, groups of gophers, colonies of ants. Humans are in between those extremes. We have individuality, but that is best served by being with members of our own tribe. With the people that understand us. People that like what we are doing and want to do the same.
That group is getting harder and harder to find for everyone. The digital world brings us ever closer to those who agree with us and drives us further apart by putting us into silos of our own making. We have never been more connected, and have never felt more alone. Most people will blame the cell phones. The internet. The political climate. But I think it is something much simpler; People need to create.
Our technology has created more things that create things for us. It has created a world where many of us find ourselves sitting in front of screens. Typing on keyboards. Searching for the next little hit of happy brain chemicals. We have become more sedentary, more secluded, and more prone to treating leisure time as time to relax. Those two things are not the same. Relaxing time is for when you are giving your body and mind a break. Giving yourself rest and recuperation, which everyone needs. Leisure time is when you are doing things that stimulate your soul. When you are spending time doing the things that make you happy. Content with life. Fulfilled and energized and challenged to be better.
Our bodies are marvels of evolution. We were created to create things! Our hands, our minds, our eyes and ears and the way we communicate, all are based on making stuff. From tools to help us farm the land, to clothes which let us live in every climate. Each new invention creates the opportunity to create more things.
Here is an example; The height of the first stage booster for the rocket in the NASA space program was made to fit through railway tunnels, so it could be manufactured and shipped to the rocket pad. It had to hold X amount of fuel and could only be Y in circumference so we could ship it via railway. The tunnels the trains go through are based on the width of the trains. The width of trains cars are based on the width of the tracks. Train tracks are based on the width of the roads from the roman empire. Those roads were based on the width of a war chariot so the roman army could do what the roman army was best at; making more romans. The width of the war chariot was based on the average width of a horse, who pulled the chariot. So, our entire space program is built off of the average width of a 5000-year-old horse’s ass. Everything builds on other things, and sometimes the reasons for amazing things are pretty ridiculous.
Stop looking at my butt.
Everyone has heard the saying ‘putting the cart before the horse’. It generally means that you should not do things in the wrong order. You have great ideas! You have ideas that can change the world. You have small ideas, like the plastic case that keeps your cell phone from breaking, or big ideas, like the cell phone itself. The problem is not ideas, it is that you don’t have access to make those ideas happen. You can’t pull the cart. You don’t have a horse. You can’t build the cart; you don’t have the tools. So, you re-watch Friends on Netflix. And you ignore that dissatisfied feeling, just like you are ignoring that you have to blink right now, and that your lips are dry.
Let me tell you about what I have built. The Fab Lab is not just a cart. It is the horse, too! I have built this space to be the innovation center of the creative corridor. Some people will argue that we already had one before I came along. We are, after all, a university town. There are lots of places to innovate in Iowa City… if you are the right kind of person.
Ask yourself what you could do if you had full access to all the tools and equipment to make your ideas a reality. Ask another person about what they have thought of that could help them in their own lives or could help the community. It seems like everyone else has more access than you do. If you are not a student, you can’t use university equipment. If you are not a contractor, how are you going to get your hands on the tools you need for that new porch, or even to just fix that chair in the kitchen?
Now ask a University of Iowa English major if they are given access to a 3D printer at the university. Ask an engineering student if they can actually use the machine shop at the university on a weekend, or during a break. Ask the clerk behind the register at your favorite gas station if they have the space (or the money) for a laser cutter. We all need the same thing. Access. And that, my friends, is why we need the Fab Lab.
Now re-read the title of this article. Go ahead. I will wait.
The Fab Lab needs members. We are a community. It needs all the ideas, and the makers, and the thinkers, and tinkerers. It needs robotics enthusiasts and quilters and machinists. It needs woodworkers and hobbyists and small businesses. It needs creators, and improvers, and entrepreneurs, and artists. It needs groups, and teachers, and projects and passion. We are a community center, and we need to build up our community. Just like your ideas can not help the world without becoming real, a Fab Lab is just a space holding tools until there is a person or people to use them.
The Fab Lab is a community space, with many community partnerships. From our student outreach, summer camps, and events for kids, to our partnership with Tate High School, The Scouts, and our support of groups like 3D printing enthusiasts, sewing clubs, and entrepreneur meetups. We want more outreach. We want to work with your group to provide space, equipment, or training, or work with you to create a new group for your interests if it doesn’t exist.
The next month is a turning point for the Fab Lab. We are raising enough money to purchase our permanent home in Iowa City. This space will give us all the room we need, from 8000 square feet now to 27,000 square feet in our new home, with the possibility of more. We need your support. Whether that is a monetary donation from you personally, from the company you work for, or from a group you are a part of. It can also be with the purchase of a 1 year membership, which can be started at any time in the next five years, and is completely transferable to any other adult as a gift.
What better gift could you give to anyone than the gift of a membership to the place where you can make your dreams and ideas a reality? What better place to get a membership for yourself so that you can find that community you are seeking? Find that tribe you have been looking for? Create that awesome idea you have been meaning to tackle for the last year?
The Fab Lab needs you. We need your ideas, your passion, your creativity, and your talents. Stop watching old Friends episodes and start making new friends. Start making your ‘I should do that’ thoughts into an ‘I did it’ list. Join us. Join your community.
Find your tribe. Build your dreams. Show us your support. We have until April 15th, 2025 to raise the money for our down payment, and we can not do it without all of you.
The Fab Lab needs Iowa City. We can’t do it without you.
-Kirk