Fabulous Fabricators:
Can we build it ... Yes we can!

Ian Simmons

Ian Simmons reports from the 2001 Fabricators' week held at Techniquest in sunny Wales.

As 2000's revived Fabricators' Week in East Fortune, Scotland only attracted a select group of participants, the 2001 event moved to a more central location - Techniquest's Bessemer Road workshops in Cardiff, with radically different results.

25 People expressed a serious intention to take part, and 16 people actually participated in the final event, making it the largest Fabricators ever. Even more pleasing, for almost all of these it was their first time at Fabricators - coming with the intention to find out more about art of exhibit building. Also pleasing was the diversity of organisations from which people came, from the massive - Millennium centres like The Eden Project and Glasgow Science Centre, to the tiny - King Alfred's School in Hampstead, where, encouraged by former pupil Richard Gregory, they are putting together their own small hands on centre. There were representatives from various design companies and an arts centre, and Scott Dillery and Frederick van Goolen who had travelled from the US and Flanders to take part.

This year's fabricators had more of a learning aspect to it than previously and many of those taking part had never built an exhibit before (and in some cases, had never built anything). So rather than launch into fettling immediately, we began with touring TQ's workshop and stores talking about materials and processes which lead to good exhibits.

With the scene setting over, the group discussed exhibit ideas and then paired up to create their exhibit prototypes. The excellent facilities in the workshop and the fact that we had one of Techniquest's top woodworkers, Bob, assigned to us to operate the large machinery made the process flow easily, sheets of MDF could be cut up and nail gunned into exhibit carcasses in moments (or so it seemed). This left the inexperienced carpenters with time to concentrate on the exhibit ideas rather than struggling with basic woodworking skills - a great boon for everyone. And a whole range of excellent exhibits they created too -

Jamila Yousaf from King Alfred's built a flexible gravity well and a friction exhibit, Ben Craven from Glasgow used cutting-edge LED's to build a lightbox in which two lights look identical, but make colours look radically different, while Steve Pizzey made a chromatic palm tree using junk CDs. Anthony Thrasher from Sci-Fun in Edinburgh collaborated with Frederick van Goolen from Technopolis, in Flanders, to create what is probably the most sophisticated exhibit ever built at Fabricators - a very neat electronic device exploring blood transfusions and blood groups, while I, on the other hand, made a tsunami by chucking a paving stone into a tank of water. Well, OK, it was a little more sophisticated than that, but not by much.

Among the other exhibits was a new take on the solar sunflower, with an inflatable flower and an elegant feather duster caterpillar, created by Heidi Dorschler, Lynsey Robinson and Hal Sylvester from Eden. Regan Forrest from Hayley Sharpe made a device which dramatised the energy efficiency of bicycles as compared to cars. These and all the others can be seen on the BIG website.

Add in pub trips, curries and a visit to @Bristol, meeting up with Richard Gregory and Priscilla Heard afterwards, and a hugely entertaining time was had by all.

The atmosphere at the event was superb and at the end everyone went home on a high - the Eden Team were not only determined to return in 2002, but also vowed to host the event in the future. Regan Forrest confessed that not only had she never built an exhibit before, but, as a DIY refusnik, had never even used a power tool before, and that it had given her a huge boost in confidence and a far greater understanding of the exhibit building process. The final day Trade Secrets seminar too went off with flair, with at least one group of participants spending the drive home in a ferment of exhibit ideas.

Looking back, I reckon this was one of the best Fabricators Weeks ever and one that bodes well for the future. Its reinvention as a time to learn about exhibit building as well as an opportunity to let exhibit builders' imagination range free has been a great success, and Fabricators will return in 2002 (not least because someone has already booked!) - venue to be announced.

Read more about the event on the BIG web site >

Newsletter Spring 2002 Contents

Fabricators' Event 2001
Skagen Odde Natur Center, Denmark
Museums Service Placement
Accessing SETNET
Fossil workshop tips
Going free entry - what are its effects?
Scientists meet the public
BIG AGM 2001 Chair's Report