Over the last decade, the Maker culture has been percolating around the world, across the nation, and right here in our own backyard. It attracts folks who want to make things themselves but often need a space, equipment, and water-cooler comrades for support and inspiration.
A number of “hacker spaces” have sprung up to accommodate these makers and the machinery they need to realize their dreams.
One of them is the fab lab, or fabrication laboratory. The movement started in 2001 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and now there are hundreds of fab labs worldwide. One of them is JC Fab Lab, at 195 New York Ave.
Fabulous Lab
On a warm Thursday afternoon in mid-July, a couple of guys are doing their thing, and JC Fab Lab’s Eric Nadler is on site to show us around. Housed in a brick factory building in the Heights, the fourth-floor space is pleasantly untidy in a factory-ish kind of way. To the uninitiated, the machines seem mysterious. There are a laser engraver, 3-D printer, and others that have a nice industrial feel. A pleasant burning smell comes from the Epilog Laser Fusion machine, which etches a design onto plywood made from an image on a laptop. Speaking of laptops, a Fab-made wood laptop holder offers an artsy and organic alternative to the usual metal holders. Machines and blowing fans provide a backdrop of white noise in the un-air-conditioned room. Through open windows, a painterly cityscape is visible.
One of the things made here was a sign for a local restaurant. Nadler made a surfboard for himself. It’s on the wall over a table that displays the pieces and products made by members.
On another table are popsicle-stick creations made by kids, including, cars, cranes, and something that looks like a trebuchet, but may not be. Kids learn how to use saws, drills, and hammers, and to fashion things from toilet-paper tubes.
On hand are books with helpful titles like “Japanese Woodworking” and “Manufacturing Process,” along with more obscure ones like “Flux,” “The Third Teacher,” “Ingenious,” and “Spoon.”
If You Make It…
The initial fab lab concept “was that it would operate like a franchise,” Nadler says. “The goal was to create a space where you could make anything. They wrote software and came up with a collection of tools.” The original team was a collaboration of scientists and artists, which was appropriate for their creative, out-of-the-box mission.
The worldwide network of fab labs has inspired innovation and resourcefulness. Nadler tells the story of a fab lab in Norway that had created a design for a traditional Norwegian sandal. Adhering to fab lab practice, they shared the design with the network. A fab lab in Kenya picked up the design but adapted it to make use of local materials: in this case, automobile tires.
Homegrown Handiwork
The 2,000-square-foot Jersey City facility opened in January of this year. Nadler says that the building is known as the mattress factory, though old-fashioned accounting ledgers were apparently manufactured in Fab Lab’s space. At first, the lab was mobile. “But the limitations became clear,” Nadler says, “and we searched for an established space in an industrial building.” The New York Avenue space, in the Riverview Arts District, already had artists and craftspeople who could share resources, including furniture restorers, woodworkers, brass workers, and a person who creates museum installations. The lab also buys and leases equipment.
“We’re trying to create community,” Nadler says. “The main drive of the Fab Lab is for people with design and engineering experience to come here, meet each other, and work together to create products to bring to market. We’re very design oriented. We create space for people to think and draw. We are very much proponents of that process.”
The lab has 40 members, some in house on a regular basis, others on a project-by-project basis.
Another sector of the business offers professional services, such as engraving and laser cutting, to fine artists, designers, architects, and clothing designers. “We’re very convenient to Midtown,” Nadler says.
The lab also offers workshops and programming for adults and kids, and after-school programs. “We’re pretty happy with our growth so far,” Nadler says. “We’ve had a great response.”
Nadler’s background is in digital design. In fact most people now inhabit a digital world, and the allure of the Fab Lab model is bringing back tangible, physical, crafted objects. Nadler says, “It’s satisfying to see physical work, and people interacting.”—JCM