The Lumberjack



Students Serving The Cal Poly Humboldt Campus and Community Since 1929

Tag: makerspace

  • Close-knit friends

    Close-knit friends

    by Victoria Olsen

    Tucked away on the second floor of the library, students gather with plastic needles and metalhooks to partake in the weekly Cal Poly Humboldt knitting group, Close-Knit Friends. This is the group’s first year back since the COVID-19 shutdown in 2020. The group was founded by Katrina Maynez, who started knitting in middle school and has enjoyed it ever since. 

    “I love doing different crafts and such, and so I really wanted to have a space where people could be creative and have that time to really be themselves and just relax and destress,” Maynez said. 

    Knitting needles and crochet hooks as well as yarn are all provided. They also provide “how-to” books and a bunch of other books with pattern ideas and ways to knit or crochet different items. 

    You are also welcome to bring your own supplies and projects if you have them.  

    Haleigh Singleton was one of many people at this event, but one of the few crocheters.

    “I taught myself during COVID, and then I’m kind of relearning as we speak,” Singleton said, intently focused on her project. 

    Close-Knit Friends welcomes all skill-levels of knitters and crocheters. If you are a pro, you are more than welcome to come by and relax with everyone. Or if you are interested in learning, they are more than happy to get you started. 

    Julien Jones’s first time ever knitting was a week prior, and they’d already made tremendous progress on their project. 

    Emma Lowe was one of the other few crocheters among the group and was working on a fairly elaborate cardigan.

    “I love crocheting, and I came last week and they taught me how to knit, so that was really cool,” Lowe said. 

    There were a variety of skill levels. Some had been at this for years, others a few months, some a week or so, and others were in the process of learning.  

    If you are interested in knitting or crocheting projects and also interested in volunteering, Y.E.S. provides a knitting group every Wednesday from 12-12:50 pm. in the library basement, Suite 1. There they work on projects such as scarves, gloves, socks, hats, etc to donate. 

    If you are feeling crafty and happen to have a free afternoon on Mondays check out “Close-Knit Friends” in the Makerspace on the second floor of the Library in room 205. They meet every Monday from 3-5 pm. 

  • The Library Makerspace gives students a place to thrive

    The Library Makerspace gives students a place to thrive

    by Ione Dellos

    The Makerspace has come a long way, starting out as a humble pop-up. It now has a dedicated room in the library, and offers expanded services so students can amplify their creativity. It’s an important space for students to create and design, where they are able to explore fabrication. The space itself also offers many wonderful hands-on activities, such as the collage station, where students can make multi-media collages from all sorts of different materials, the vinyl cutting station, or the augmented reality sandbox, where students can stick their hands in the sand.

    Cyril Oberlander may be the University Library Dean on paper, but in person, he is a very vocal supporter of Makerspace. Much like a pot of pasta you turned up too high and then left on the stove, he is bubbling over with enthusiasm for the Makerspace, and he gleefully talks about all the programs that the Makerspace offers for students. 

    “We really want to create a space for what people are interested in!” Oberlander said. “We’re going to roll out the vinyl cutter this semester, so you can do paper crafts or do vinyl for stickers or ironing. We have a guitar you can check out, and we have some other audio equipment that you can take home.”

    You can see the sparkle in his eyes as he talks, and he looks proudly around the Makerspace as he shows the crown jewels of the room. There is a beautifully shiny yellow electric guitar, a sewing machine surrounded by associated fabric squares, an audio workstation complete with a studio microphone and headphones, and two brand new 3-D printers that members of the Makerspace assembled themselves. While set-up of the printers was “pretty easy,” and only took an hour, the real beast was getting them to work as intended.

    “They were pretty difficult to calibrate and to get working,” Oberlander said. 

    There were some initial anxieties about a lack of funding for the program, but in true Makerspace spirit, they built out and shaped funding around actual use. Oberlander does not feel daunted by their request for funding being denied, and expects that the Makerspace will get more funding in the future. 

    “We have gotten funding in the past, and so we expect that we will get funding again,” Oberlander said.

    Jonathan Pena Centes, head audio expert at the Makerspace, personally appreciates the equipment they have available to check out. Growing up, he didn’t have access to a lot of the resources now found in the Makerspace, and that’s why this function is so important to him. 

    “A lot of students don’t know about this resource,” Pena Centes said. “It’s a great resource for students who don’t have access to the original materials.”

    The Makerspace’s hours are 1-7 pm, Tuesday through Friday, although hours are subject to change with their student staff working their schedules out around fall classes. It is located on the second floor of the school library, right by the exit of the stairs that lead up from the Library Café.