A new hub for innovation in digital technology and manufacturing is set to open in Coventry city centre.
The ‘Fab Lab” project has been led by a collaboration of local influencers including Coventry University, University of Warwick, Coventry City Council’s Job Shop, Positive Youth Foundation and Imagineer Productions. The aim is to bolster the city’s engagement with science, technology and maths subjects, tackling the skills gap and hopes to raise the aspirations of Coventry’s youth, while also supporting Coventry’s application for City of Culture 2021.
The Fab Lab Coventry will join a network of such hubs around the UK offering the public access to computer aided design (CAD) machines, 3D printers, scanners, laser cutting machines and testing stations for digital electronics. The ‘Lab’ will open in a formerly vacant property in Coventry’s City Arcade.
The first ‘Fab Lab’ was opened in 2010 by Manchester’s Manufacturing Institute while similar sites have opened in London, Cockermouth, Belfast, Ellesmere, Ironbridge, Londonderry, Falmouth, Port and Airedale in West Yorkshire. The idea first originated in the U.S. by MIT professor Niel Gershenfeld and has ambitions to develop a UK-wide network of labs engaging with 250,000 by the year 2020.
For more information, visit the Coventry Fab Lab’s dedicated website
For more information regarding Fab Labs around the world, visit: https://www.fablabs.io/
