By Madina Toure
The annual World Maker Faire brought 80,000 people from around the country to the New York Hall of Science in Corona last weekend to celebrate invention and creation—spanning areas such as arts, crafts, food, engineering, music, science and technology.
Highlights of the two-day family festival, held at the museum at 47-01 111th St., included a 3D printing village with the latest on additive manufacturing, or processes used to integrate a 3D object; a 16-piece, 50,000-pound life-size mousetrap; power-tool drag racing; a drone sports event; and Robert Resurrection, a 30-foot tall, human-piloted articulating sculpture, 95 percent of which is made from airplane parts.
Paul Posner of Massapequa, an exhibitor at the festival, started making his Infinity clocks four years ago and hopes to become better known in the maker space.
“I’m hoping to make a little bit of noise in the maker space,” Posner said.
Virginia resident Zachary Wong, 10, a sixth grader, has his own 3D printing business in which he prints items such as figurines, dinosaurs, aliens and action figures that he sells at a farmers’ market. He started the business last year. He gave a presentation on his book during the fair.
“I generally go to every Maker Faire I find,” Wong said.
The event seeks to promote the Maker Space, a learning environment in which children, teenagers, adults and families can tinker, design and create together.
Attendees praised the festival and the variety of creations. Meg Julian, 40, of Nutley, N.J., said that she and her family were checking out the drag racing, the mousetrap and a water filtration unit utilizing plants.
“(It’s) just a nice day event where the kids can be exposed to exciting new things that are somewhat exceptional,” Julian said. “They’re educational but fun.”
Sarah Kingsley, 38, and Beau Turner, 40, came from North Virginia to participate in the festival.
Kingsley said she was impressed by the 20-foot-tall 3D printer as well as a little boy standing on a wheel as it moved.
“He’s just standing like this and there’s a wheel under his feet,” she said. “It was crazy.”
Turner, who runs 757 Makerspace, a community workshop and prototyping center, saw the community side of the event, noting that all the inventors have multiple skills in addition to the main one they put on display at the festival.
“It’s really this interesting transition and the makers are no longer separate people that specialize in one niche,” he said.
Reach reporter Madina Toure by e-mail at mtour
