Merel Bekking

Sketch Embroidery

Dutch designer Merel Bekking finds a creative community within API. Read about her experience of the FabLab below:

As a young(ish) Dutch designer/artist I just moved to Bangor, North Wales. Knowing very little about this wonderful place I started to look for what is happening within the creative industries around here. I was very happy to find out that I didn’t have to look far at all. Pontio has his own Innovation Centre, right here in Bangor. Even better, it is open to the public! So since this discovery, all my Fridays are Fab.

Moving to a new place, especially one you don’t know anything about, can be quite daunting. One of the first things I did is to investigate the creative identity of North Wales and search for likeminded artistic people. Back in The Netherlands I have always had fantastic workspaces and studios where I could experiment and create, where I could work on new designs and make prototypes. Now I am here I needed to look to a new place that will allow me to do the same. After a quick search online I ran into Pontio Fablab, part of Pontio Innovation Centre, a place filled with digital manufacturing and prototyping equipment. That is where I needed to be! Luckily they have a day called FabFriday where, as a member of the public, you can use these machines for free. So I’ve quickly booked a ticket for the induction to see what this place was all about.

On Friday morning there was a group of ten or so people, all eager to learn more about the what sort of place this is. We met with the fantastic Sara, one of the team members, and we were given a tour through the workplaces. She gave us an explanation about the overwhelming amount of (brand new) machinery and what they can do. It was a great morning where everyone ended up very inspired. When I went home my mind was overloaded with new ideas and sparks of projects. All the possibilities this place has!

It wasn’t a big surprise that I came back the following week, eager to learn something new. Of all the machinery Fablab houses I fell in love slightly with the digital embroidery machine during the first induction. I booked a training for this specific piece of technology and within 2 hours we have gone through the basic instructions. I now could understand it, I could control it and was ‘licenced’ use the it. This was wonderful!

As I have learned the basics my head was filling with things I wanted to create, discover and make. Since then I’ve been coming back as much as I can. Luckily the team is very happy for me to experiment with the machine, looking for what it can do, and where its boundaries are. Difficult questions from my side are answered with “I don’t know if it can do that, but let’s find out”. It is a great environment where experiment is encouraged. And the knowledge the Innovation team has is unbelievable and very helpful. You can go to FabFriday without any knowledge of digital manufacturing and learn, get creative and grow big. It’s is a place that really inspires and it’s very approachable. On top of that, on these FabFridays there are more people from all sorts of backgrounds creating new things, using all sorts of machines. You chat, you learn, you discover new projects and approaches. Exactly what I’ve been looking for. If only it would be open to the public on more days than just the Friday…

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Now for the last few weeks I’ve been playing around with this fantastic machine, trying to understand it and create the things that are in my head. It’s been wonderful, it feels like I am collaborating with this big, super-fast device. I have pieces of embroidered cloth laying around everywhere and at night I dream of my next projects. It won’t be long until these tests will grow into bigger, more ambitious projects in embroidery. The machine and I will make new products and design great artworks together. Can’t wait to see what we will punch out next time I’m there.

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