Itching to make something with your hands? Whether it’s furniture, something you 3D print or wearable technology, you’ll soon be able to make it at the new Fuse33 MakerSpace when it opens to the public on January 2, 2018.
At approximately 9,000-square feet spread over two floors, Fuse33 is the biggest makerspace in the city. The building, located just off International Avenue, houses tons of equipment that Calgarians can use to make just about anything they’d like by signing up for monthly memberships or paying a drop-in rate.
On the “dirty” side of the workshop, there are work tables, hand and power tools, a wood shop with equipment like table saws, jointers and planers, an enclosed welding space, a large laser cutter and more. In this area, you can also check out the shop’s unofficial “mascot:” a big, purple metal hippo head that was featured at last year’s Burning Man festival in Nevada.
The “clean space” houses a sewing and electronics lab filled with sergers, embroidery machines and 3D printers.
Upstairs, the team is building a small business incubator with 10 rentable spaces. There will also be a kitchenette and a collaborative work space up there. “[It’s] basically a little co-working space inside a makerspace,” explains Max Schlagel, the Managing Director at Fuse33.
In addition to regular certification classes to teach you how to use the various kinds of equipment, Fuse33 will offer workshops and private sessions with professional carpenters, welders, machinists and more. These launch in January and will cater to a range of experience levels.
“We are excited to have a lot of classes [and] to have parents, kids and whole families come in to share the space. Just to get that mixture of all different types of people coming in under one roof and cross-pollinating with each other. And who knows what can happen,” Schlagel says.
“Our mandate here is that we are ultimately just a place with some cool tools, but how you use them remains to be seen.”
1720 Radisson Dr. S.E., fuse33.com