Setting Up a Home “Making Space” After Professional and Academic-Based Ones Built for Everyday Learning, Creativity, and Innovation

Abstract

Common artists, crafters, artisans, and DIY (do-it-yourself) makers need spaces to explore their inspirations and creativity and to advance their making skills. They need a place to set up their equipment. They need a physical location to store their supplies and reference materials and incomplete works. They may need a virtual space to create, too, to harness the power of computation. They need a market for their goods. They need a community, in the real and the virtual, for emotional support, ideas, and camaraderie. There is little known in the way of how these at-home making spaces may be set up for the best outcomes, broadest ranges of possibilities, and ultimate creativity, but it is thought that some insights from professional maker spaces and the academic literature may inform on this challenge. This exploratory work offers some initial ideas from the literature review and applied action research in an auto-ethnographic case.