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Exposure provides a forum for student groups and area non-profits at Michigan State University and the Greater Lansing area. On the show, you'll hear discussions about the groups themselves as well as the relevant issues of today.
This is exposures on Impact 89 FM.
Amanda:W DBM East Lansing.
Tessa Kresch:The show that lets you know about everything that goes on at the MSU campus that you otherwise might not know about. Tune in every Sunday at 9 AM. I'm your host, Tessa Creusch. Welcome to exposure. Hello.
Tessa Kresch:Hello. And welcome back to exposure. You are listening to season 15. I'm your host, Tessa Creusch. We all know the MSU library is more than just a library.
Tessa Kresch:Today, we're talking about a space on the second floor called the Selma d and Stanley c Hollander Makerspace. It's a space where creativity meets collaboration, offering everything from workshops to high-tech equipment, All designed to help students experiment and build. From 3 d printing to laser cutting, this makerspace offers a range of tools and workshops that supports creative projects and hands on learning. I'm here with Grace, Amanda and Jamie. Thank you guys so much for joining me today.
Amanda:Thanks for having us.
Grace:Thank you very much.
Jamie:Thank you.
Tessa Kresch:Absolutely. Alright. And before we begin, could you guys introduce yourselves?
Jamie:Yeah. So my name is Jamie Moriarty, and I'm the coordinator for the Hollander Makerspace.
Amanda:My name is Amanda Tickner, and I am the geographic information services librarian, makerspace librarian, urban planning librarian, and anthropology librarian. So lots of hats. Today, I'm wearing the makerspace hat.
Grace:My name is Grace Denchamp. I am a 4th year landscape architecture student and a student supervisor at the makerspace.
Tessa Kresch:Space. Alright. Fantastic. Well, let's back up and take a look at the library as a whole. Tell me a little bit about the opportunities that present themselves in the library and where this maker space exists.
Amanda:So we are in the second floor of what the library calls wing, but really it's tower. So if you think of the library as having 2 towers, we are on the west tower on the 2nd floor. A lot of, people don't make it off the 1st floor. People come in, and they find their place to sit, and they get their coffee, and they never explore upwards. But there's a lot of stuff on the other floors that may be of interest to folks.
Tessa Kresch:Let's say I'm walking up to the 2nd floor on the west wing. What exactly am I seeing?
Amanda:You're walking in the doors. And to the left, you're gonna see the makerspace. If you're if you're walking in the stairwell that's right before the Starbucks. Okay. You're gonna walk in.
Amanda:You're gonna see some cool carpet. That cool carpet belongs to Digital Scholarship Lab. So don't follow the cool carpet. Look look for the 3 d printers, and that's us. So it's a small glass walled space that has all sorts of things in it, which we can talk more extensively about.
Jamie:The makerspace is actually a really small room on the 2nd floor. So sometimes people walk right past it and and don't even stop and pay attention. Not all of the rooms in the library have lights that can turn off. So the makerspace actually does have independent lights. And so sometimes when we're closed and those lights are off, it's not easy to see that it is the cool space with 3 d printers.
Jamie:And so people just walk right past. It is a small room on the second floor of the west wing, but there is a ton of equipment and really cool things jam packed inside this little area. So I highly encourage people to check it out and and take a look. We've got toys and freebies and and really cool stuff to look at.
Grace:When I first came to MSU as a freshman, I specifically sought out the makerspace because I enjoy making, and I enjoy creating things. And when I first came up the library with the cool carpet library stairs with the cool carpet, I was a little intimidated by the DSL, and then I kept walking. And then I became slightly more intimidated by the makerspace with all of its beautiful machines and everything. But then when I walked inside, I was immediately greeted by a very friendly, very interested in making, staff member, and I immediately felt at home because everyone has just such a friendly, helpful vibe about creating and making because we train our students to know as much about the space as we can and even beyond that. So if you're ever stuck on a project or you're interested about 3 d printing, laser cutting, or you just wanna see a really cool space and hang out, we've recently had, I think, a, video game design, team come in and work on their game in the space.
Grace:It's really interesting to see how they interact with our different equipment and interact with themselves and just try to make the spaces welcoming to all sorts of people, all sorts of majors, and all sorts of students and community patrons.
Tessa Kresch:So before we get into the nitty gritty of the resources available to students in that room, tell me a little bit about the history of the space itself.
Amanda:So the space started out because Terrence O'Neil, who is the entrepreneurship librarian, decided we needed a makerspace. That's pretty much the baseline. So it did have, at first, a kind of serious entrepreneurial focus. The idea was is that it could help people prototype things for business, honestly, and then also kind of had some functions around making models for classes and things of that sort. So it had it was it was very fixated on on practical applications as opposed to making for enjoyment.
Amanda:And it evolved over time because at first when we started, there was just a couple of 3 d printers. And, you know, this was about 10 years ago. And so 3 d printers at the time were quite a bit more expensive, than they are now. And so it was kind of a big deal to have them as opposed to now, where it's not quite such a big deal. Now the important part is the expertise in managing and running them.
Amanda:But when it started, you know, they they were kind of a novelty. And so the primary thing that we had were those 3 g printers. And then we had kind of a space that was orient we had whiteboards and Legos and things so that people could talk about design and, you know, engage in that way. But there wasn't a lot of other stuff, I guess. And then we got the laser cutter.
Amanda:And then, eventually, you know, it just just built and built and built. And when we first started, we didn't have a lot of what we have now, which are make stations, which is something that when I came on board, I wanted to sort of get the space into more of a collaborative making space where people maybe somebody who is working on soldering and creating electronics could talk to the person who is sewing, you know, that kind of thing, where there could be cross project engagement between people who are actually making things as opposed to just kind of a design space. Although it still functions as a design space, I don't wanna down you know, say that it can't do that anymore because, obviously, people come in there all the time. The video game folks did. And there's nice whiteboards, and it's perfectly set up for that.
Amanda:So but it has we've gotten more and more equipment over time. We've had more and more printers, more student staff. Just it's just expanded and expanded and within its tiny little footprint, just kind of a bit of a a Tetris puzzle to try and get everything to fit. But Jamie's done a wonderful job with that. We had to build up.
Jamie:Yeah. Yes. We've gone vertical with the actors. We're we're out of horizontal space.
Tessa Kresch:We're working on top of each other in there? Yeah. Yeah.
Jamie:But when I started in the space in 2019, we had, I think, 2 of our make stations. And to me, a makerspace is really about, you know, hands on experiential learning. And so I was right on board with Amanda of getting more and more of those hands on, you can use the equipment yourself kind of stations. And those have grown quite a bit and been really popular, and so that's something I'm I'm really excited about.
Amanda:Yeah. We also sort of shifted from having kind of a, I don't know, a technology emphasis to we've accepted crafting into the into the purview of things that we do, which I think is good because I want to have a range of activities so that people don't have to be doing complex electronic projects or CAD design or kind of things on the more difficult end of the spectrum. You can come in and use a sewing machine.
Tessa Kresch:Right.
Amanda:You know? And then maybe the other things become demystified, or you're interested as you go in learning more about different things. And then you can expand the range of activities that you're doing. But I think having that low barrier to entry, especially people don't have a lot of time. You can't always learn all the things.
Amanda:Like, having ways for people to do making where it's not taking on a whole new skill set in a low key kind of way is important. And so we've expanded in that direction, I think, as well with some of our events and adding more sewing machines and things of that sort to our we also have a borrowable collection that's been building over time. So we have What? Sewing machines for for checkout, cameras for checkout, and those sites of things. And we did have a few of those from the jump, but that collection has really built out over time as well.
Amanda:Oh, and books. We didn't used to have books, but now we have a little set of books that are specific to the Makerspace and Makerspace Technologies that are present in the space.
Tessa Kresch:This seems like fantastic resources for people who need to do this for school projects or creative projects. But let's say, me, for example, walks in, never used a sewing machine before. Is there kind of an educational setting where people can learn how to use these equipment?
Jamie:Yeah. So we have a couple of different ways that you could learn a thing. You can attend a workshop or one of our events. So we do clothing repairathons every semester, which is a great way to get, you know, started with a sewing machine and hang out with some people who might know more than you do to help you, you know, with a a specific project. So, you know, we've had people come in with, like, oh, here's my pair of pants that I love, and the pocket's got a hole in it.
Jamie:I don't know how to fix this. And we'll sit down and teach you how to use a sewing machine and how to how to fix a hole in a pocket, things like that. I do have an intro to sewing event coming up, but we also have, some online training for our self-service equipment, so people can take a short video training with a safety quiz, before they come in to use the equipment.
Tessa Kresch:I wanna talk about the equipment that is available. We already talked about the laser cutting and the 3 d printing, which is so cool that that's available to students, and I had no idea about that. What else is available to students in that room?
Jamie:Yeah. So we've got kind of 3 different ways that you can access equipment. The first one is our fabrication service, which includes most of our 3 d printers, laser cutter, and CNC router. That is equipment that you send us files and staff operates the equipment for you because they're just more expensive, more hazards involved, that sort of a deal. So the fabrication service is what people know us for the most.
Jamie:I mean, people are like, that's the place of the 3 d printers. I'm like, but wait, there's more. So our second mode of service is the self-service equipment. So that's kind of the make stations that we've been talking about, and that includes our Cricut cutter, Silhouette cutter, our button makers. We have a self-service 3 d printer, an electronic soldering station, a vacuum former, sewing machine, a serger, which is a special kind of sewing machine, an embroidery machine.
Jamie:I am trying to think if there's anything I'm missing.
Grace:Beautiful tool wall
Amanda:with Yeah. The tool wall. Tools. Don't undersell.
Jamie:You have a whole wall, of just tools and supplies and things that you might need to make something. So things like hot glue, clamps for gluing something, glue, tape, pliers, screwdrivers, just a a wide variety of tools that you can, you know, set up in in the maker space and utilize to to build things and whatnot. Our last set of services is our lending technology. So we lend out DSLR and mirrorless cameras, which are good for photo and video needs, audio recorders, tripods, light kits, more sewing machines, lots of sewing machines, some more sergers. We even have low tech things like hand mending kits.
Jamie:Like, if you just need some thread and needles, like, we have a kit that you can check out for that. We have electronic kits like Raspberry Pi, Arduino, FLORA GPS kits, kinda like little computers that you can utilize, interact with the world, and program. We also have other just tools and things that you can check out. So digital calipers, like, you're 3 d modeling at home, and you need to measure some things. Like, check out some calipers.
Jamie:We have, like, wireless Bluetooth mice. So if you're 3 d modeling on a laptop with a trackpad, it's just gonna make your life easier to come check out a mouse. We have drawing tablets for, like, use with graphic design softwares and things like that. We also have, like, zine making kits and little kits of just, like, markers, glue, scissors, and tape. So we have a a whole range of, like, low fidelity making equipment to high technology equipment that you can use.
Tessa Kresch:A lot of the equipment that you named, I've never heard of in my life. Is it available to all students, really? If I wanted to go in there, I can use the space for even creative projects such as hemming a dress?
Jamie:Absolutely. I'll do you one better. We're actually open to everyone. You don't even have to be a part of MSU to use the makerspace. Anyone can use the space.
Jamie:We are never gonna be like, is this for your class? No. Please. I actually think that sometimes students get the best learning experience working on personal projects. And we've even had students that, like, take a class maybe in, like, apparel or textile design.
Jamie:They have access to equipment in that class. And then when the class is over, they wanna continue using those skills, but they lose access to equipment. That's one
Amanda:of the reasons why the library has a makerspace is just that we are not siloed. So we are not just serving one department. We're serving the whole campus. Mhmm. And so it's a nice place for the university to invest in technologies because then everyone can use them, and so it's efficient as opposed to things that are just in a department locked in a closet, which is where, frankly, a lot of the 3 d printers are on campus.
Amanda:So it's it's open to everyone. And we take in the library, we take our mission our land grant, you know, university mission, as fraught as that is, very seriously. So we are you know, community members are very much included in our services.
Tessa Kresch:That's fantastic because it seems like a great space for people of other majors to collaborate when they usually would not. You mentioned that it's just so important for people to be doing things as opposed to just learning about them. And tell me why else you think a space like this is important.
Grace:I'm a fierce defender of the right to repair. I think that goes for everything from your cell phone or your speaker to address. I think it is especially important now with how often and how much people are consuming to kind of slow down and and take the time to reflect on your personal items and if you can expand, their lifespan even just by, like, a year or 2. Speaking of our books, we have many books on hand mending, and we also have books about bookbinding, which is kind of ironic. But we kind of put an emphasis on taking time to explore your surroundings and explore parts of your life that you maybe never considered the processes that went into making them from everything from sewing to Raspberry Pis to mini computers.
Grace:We did a workshop on chocolate and what goes into making chocolate and the everything from the molds to kinda discussing the impact that our food could have on the environment. So right to repair and right to learn, honestly.
Tessa Kresch:Yeah. Really helps with sustainability. Mhmm.
Jamie:Yeah. I often think about making as an act of sustainability sometimes where, you know, like, a common thing that people come into the makerspace to use is, like, lab researchers who have a piece of lab equipment from the dawn of time, and there's, like, a little unimportant part that broke. And they're like, oh, I need I need this fixed for my research project, but also this piece of equipment is incredibly expensive. This one is so old, and there's no way to get replacement parts. And we're like, yes.
Jamie:We can fabricate a knob. Like, that is an easy thing to 3 d print. So there's all kinds of situations. Like, we had, a community user come in to be like, I have this dryer, and it is my favorite dryer ever. I do not want to buy a new dryer.
Jamie:And this one silly little latch mechanism broke. Like, maybe we can think about, you know, oh, how could we model that or 3 d print it to keep your dryer lid closed so that it dries your clothes? Like and so there's lots of situations where where making can be an act of sustainability. We also do events in collaboration with Spartan Upcycle, which is the creative reuse branch from the Surplus and Recycling Center. And so we collaborate on a couple of events throughout the semester.
Jamie:The clothing repairathon is one of those to kind of bring in making in, in a sustainability focus. I also think of learning how to make and create things as something that's kind of empowering. Like once you learn these skills of how to make something, all of a sudden, everything you do throughout your life, and you're like, oh, I could make that.
Tessa Kresch:Right.
Jamie:Oh, I can make that better. Like, oh, I could fix this thing. And so I love when I, like, teach, you know, these skills and concepts of, you know, something as simple as sewing machine or or laser cutting, and just seeing where people are, like, get really excited, like, oh, now I can use this for other things. Yeah. I can improve things in my life.
Tessa Kresch:Makes you think about the world a little bit differently.
Jamie:Yeah. Absolutely. And, like, once you learn 3 d modeling, you're you're you'll just everywhere you go, you'll be like, oh, I could make that. Like, oh, I could design that.
Amanda:I would say that one of the things that it does do, it we haven't unfortunately, it hasn't done this as well as I would like, honestly, but I it is something that I want to see, is the community building part of it, where, potentially, people could be teaching each other stuff or talking about their projects. And I have heard from people that it is pleasant to just go in the space and not talk to anyone, which is fine too. But I do think we don't have a a large number of what I would call 3rd places, right, where people can just go and hang out and hang out with the same people repeatedly and do activities together. We, I feel like, used to have more of those, and now libraries are running the sort of, I think, last third places in a way. Yeah.
Amanda:And the space does serve can serve as that for people who are making things.
Jamie:I think that we were really seeing this community generation, happen in the makerspace in, like, February of 2020. And then the pandemic really kind of derailed that community generation. So it's something we've been focusing a lot on coming out of the pandemic of, like, how do we rebuild that community back? Especially being on campus with our primary audience being students, like, the students that knew of the Makerspace and the pandemic have graduated.
Amanda:Right.
Jamie:And so it's, like, challenging to, yeah, get that knowledge. Like, hey. We're here, and we're a place for you to come and make stuff. But we've been doing 3rd Thursday crafting events, and I was hanging out with the one yesterday, actually. And it was really beautiful that many of the people attending that had been at prior events and were like, oh, I remember you from that cycle planter event.
Jamie:And what have you been working on? And, like, that kind of connections are are starting to come back post pandemic, which is really nice to see.
Tessa Kresch:You just mentioned the workshops that you guys offer on the 3rd Thursday of every month. Right?
Jamie:Yeah. So we're doing 3rd Thursday. Those are kind of a drop in style crafting, so it's not a structured, we're gonna teach you a thing. So it's there for, you know, take a take a study break, take a break with us, come get excited about making things. So those are the 3rd Thursday crafting.
Jamie:We also do other workshops that are open that are a little more structured or educational focused. So we've got the intro to sewing event coming up. Amanda already ran an intro to 3 d scanning event earlier this semester. So we do a variety of stuff like that.
Amanda:We also you know, if you are a student organization and you want to have an event associated with us, there's the possibility of that depending on our capacity to do custom events for people. Yeah.
Jamie:We've done a whole of events specific to organizations. 1 was, like, an engineering club, and they were like, hey. Can you come talk to us about 3 d modeling? I'm like, there is nothing I would rather do at 7 PM on a Tuesday. Let's talk about 3 d modeling.
Jamie:And so that was, those are really, fruitful experience. So
Grace:Jamie, I don't know if you wanna talk about professors and reaching out and having classes work with the makerspace.
Amanda:Oh, that's where we're most interested in doing that, actually.
Tessa Kresch:I I
Amanda:mean, that's our big thing is if professors want to integrate our services into classes. That's that's actually our primary function. So we help facilitate things for professors that maybe don't have quite the capacity or the space to to put that and and we also give suggestions on how to integrate it into curriculum, so ideas for activities that classes could do that may fit with the subject matter of the course and things like that. So we can talk to professors about that and and help get making into their classes. We just had a history class in not too long ago.
Amanda:And, you know, so there's sort of a range of activities in that, as we talked about, like, you know, kind of there's a spectrum from easy to difficult. And that was just cardboard fabrication. They were making historical buildings. And I think that was a a good icebreaker activity for the class and also got them thinking about what was important what was the most important pieces to convey if you were going to try and express a subject through a physical medium. Right?
Amanda:Like, what are the important pieces of this historical event or building that you needed to convey in order to get them across in cardboard? You know? So I think it was a useful exercise for the class, but that's just one example. Like, that's the easy example, but then we also have 3 d modeling and and things of that sort that we've integrated into a lot of classes.
Tessa Kresch:Are there any other examples of workshops that you've done or classes that you've been able to integrate your things into?
Jamie:Yeah. You know, I just, this week, wrapped up running some classes actually with an entrepreneurship class. So we have not
Amanda:lost No. We're still there.
Tessa Kresch:Out.
Jamie:And so that's a a class that we've been working with every semester. They get some really basic intro to 3 d modeling, and then they get some functional prototypes out of that intro to 3 d modeling workshop and use that to really explore the rest of the entrepreneurship stages. So using those physical prototypes to gather, like, customer feedback and to make assessment on whether or not their designs achieved their goals for for creating a new product. So sometimes people come to the makerspace and and learn a little bit of 3 d modeling. But depending on the class objectives, it it it's a wide variety of why activities make sense for that class.
Jamie:Amanda mentioned that the cardboard was, like, easy. Like, from a technical perspective, of course, cardboard is easy. We've all worked with cardboard, but there's still really, like, high level concepts conveyed through that. Like like, how do you express ideas visually, and what parts of a building are most important to convey, and how can you convey that in different mediums is is some high level skills that are transferable. Other class examples, we work with landscape architecture class that does laser cuts, and they build scaled deck models of their designs.
Jamie:We work with interior design to 3 d print furniture design so students can get a physical object that they can share and display with others in a more interactive way. It also helps them get more feedback off of their physical 3 d model instead of just having a visual rendering or a flat two dimensional image of a 3 d design.
Tessa Kresch:For you guys personally, tell me a resource that you found to be especially helpful or just or just fun to use in the makerspace.
Jamie:Personally, I'm glad we have a Cricut cutter because I didn't wanna buy 1, and I don't know where I would put it in my house. And I only need a Cricut cutter, like, once a month at most, and I just really don't wanna buy 1 and put it somewhere. May I ask what is a Cricut cutter? Yeah. A Cricut cutter so I mentioned that we have Cricut and Silhouette.
Jamie:Those are competitor brands that basically do the same thing. They're electronic cutting machines. Basically, you take some thin material and put it on a sticky mat and feed it into the machine, and it is a computer controlled blade that goes and cuts on top of a thin material. So what's really nice about these is you can cut a wide variety of things on them. So they're often used for, like, adhesive vinyl, for stickers, or heat transfer vinyl for making t shirts.
Jamie:They also cut fabric. So we've had a quilter come in and cut out some really complex fabric cuts that were, like, really pristine and nice for something that would have been too time consuming to cut by hand.
Tessa Kresch:And not as precise, I imagine.
Jamie:And not as precise. Absolutely. So personally, I do stain glass at home, and so I cut out all my designs and adhesive vinyl to use them as templates for my stained glass. And that I don't know. It helps my process a lot, and it helps me make, like, more accurate cuts in the glass because I have a really accurate template to to work off of.
Grace:Yeah. I also love the Cricut precisely because of those incredibly intricate cuts. I think I would lose my mind if I had to do them by hand. I also really love the laser cutter because there's basically no limit to what you can create with the laser cutter. I've seen everything from trophies to name tags to bookmarks to wall art.
Grace:I love the laser cutter with the amount of creative possibilities.
Tessa Kresch:Is there a cost to use the resources in the space?
Jamie:So we try to keep the cost for things as low as possible. Our fabrication service is something that our student employees use the equipment for use. There's, a cost based around our cost recovery model. We really are just trying to recoup the cost of supplies and materials and maintenance for equipment. So we try and keep that as low as possible.
Jamie:We always send a quote before, like, we don't just, like, charge people. So if you ever get a cost from us and you're like, wow, that's not affordable for me, please come talk to us. We do a lot of consultation work around cost optimization, or maybe thinking about how to use a different technology to keep things as affordable as they can be. Our self-service equipment and our lending technology, there's no cost to use that equipment. So you can check out the equipment just like a book, but there are overdue fines.
Jamie:So bring the stuff back on time and there won't be an overdue.
Tessa Kresch:Treat it like a library.
Jamie:Treat it like a library. So there there are some supplies that we sell, but there's actually no cost to use the equipment itself.
Tessa Kresch:We talked about the workshops that you guys have. Could you highlight some upcoming events that people can look forward to?
Jamie:Yeah. So we are definitely doing the 3rd Thursday crafting every month, except for, like, December when nobody's here. We have an upcoming workshop for intro to machine sewing. So if you have no idea where to get started with using sewing machine, that would be a great workshop to go to. We also have, clothing repairathon this semester.
Jamie:If you are looking for any of our events and workshops, if you get to the library's web page and make it to the makerspace web page. There is a list of all upcoming events on the main page on the website.
Tessa Kresch:If anybody wants more information about the Makerspace, the resources available, and the workshops you guys have to offer, is that where they would go?
Jamie:Yeah. The website would be a great first step, but you can always just come into the space. Come visit us on 2 West. We have flyers for all of our workshops and events. So if you want a piece of paper to put on your fridge, we have those.
Jamie:You can also email us. Our email address is liblib, like short for library, dotmakerspace@msu.edu.
Grace:I think I think everyone honestly, if you're ever stuck in a creative rut and you need inspiration, genuinely just walking inside the library in general, but inside the makerspace, there's so many things happening at once, and there's so many different kinds of equipment out.
Jamie:I just wanna add, if you're ever like, I need a tool to do a project, and I must buy it. Don't. Just come to the makerspace. Like, just ask us if we have the thing that you're looking for, because chances are, there's some way that you can utilize a tool already in the space instead of having to go buy a thing to do a class assignment or something like that.
Tessa Kresch:The amount of things I've bought for classes, including a sewing needle and some buttons, I'm so upset about it now. So It hurts my heart. And that's it for our show. Thank you to everyone involved in making this podcast what it is. If you like what you've heard, come back next week.
Tessa Kresch:I'm Tessa Kresch. You've been listening
Grace:to Exposure.
Tessa Kresch:This was this week's episode of Exposure. Keep in mind that the views and opinions discussed on Exposure are those of the guests and do not necessarily reflect those of the staff at Impact 89 FM. If you're interested in going back and listening to our archive of stories, feel free to check out our website at impact89fm.org. And of course, if you're interested in what's going on next week, you can tune back in and we'll see you back here. You've been listening to Exposed.