Monday, October 22, 2007

Maker Faire















My favorite part of Maker Faire was the craft area. They had a focus mainly clothing and bags, and this area inluded the Swap-o-Rama where you could bring in your own clothes and take what other people brought.

Swap - O - Rama
clothing exchange














Stitch Demo













One demo that I watched at Maker Faire was at the Stitch booth. The person there was talking about different ways to transfer patterns or drawings onto fabric for embroidering. She mentioned that graphite paper worked well on most fabrics and that white graphite paper was good for especially dark fabrics. You use these papers to trace your design onto your stitching surface and they, unlike some other mediums used for this purpose, usually do not leave unwanted smears on your fabric. Also, she talked about different types of backing that you can place on the inside of stretchy fabric to make it an easier surface to embroider. (There are lots of different types - some stay on permanently, others you peel off after you've finished stitching. There are also different thicknesses; she recommended a somewhat thin type.)

Recycled plastic bag backpacks at a craft booth














Screenprinting Demo














Also in the craft area, there was a really cool screen-printing demonstration. They had a selection of prints and ink colors to choose from and blow dryers set up so that you could dry the print on your clothing before leaving.

Green Cars














Another neat part of the Maker Faire were the green/environmentally-friendly cars. There was a whole area devoted to alternative vehicles.

Art Cars














There was also a lot full of art cars. My two favorites were the Cameravan and the YarnCar.
There was also a car covered in astroturf, one decorated with sculpted metal, one covered with snowballs, one painted to look like bricks, etc.

CameraVan














YarnCar





























Bike-Music Sculpture














One last thing that I saw was a sculpture made of a bike with metal funnels attached on each end. It had strings attached on the front end and different music boxes attached to the other. The metal funnels projected the music pretty loudly when you plucked a string or turned a music box. It was a very interesting and unique piece of art.

Overall, Maker Faire was a cool experience... I'll probably try to go again next time!

2 comments:

Super Sloan said...

Looks awesome! I'm glad someone went to that Fair. I didn't go :>

CharlotteMD said...

Yeah, it was fun... you should go next time!