New creation center set to open in Decatur

DECATUR, Ill. (WAND) - A brand new, state of the art facility known as a 'makerspace' is getting ready for it's Grand Opening in Decatur tomorrow.

"It's a unique space," Sam Johnson, President of Thinkwell said. "Makerspaces are showing up all across the globe and Decatur, as a maker town, it's about time we had our own maker space."

Creativity has always been a strength to the Decatur community, but it has lacked a place where people can come together and share ideas, something that Thinkwell hopes their makerspace will become.

"A lot of times it's not the expertise in the skills and the tools that's lacking, it's the ideas and the thing to plug it into," Jesse Blunt, Executive Director of Thinkwell said. "That's a big part of the makerspace is that collective, making things together and kind of creating that creative culture and community in Decatur."

There are a lot of things that you can do once you get inside.

"There's a soft arts area where you can work with sewing and materials and textiles and do screen printing." Johnson continued, saying, "You can go into the rapid prototyping area where you can work with 3-D printers and CNC routers, things like that. We have all sorts of art supplies and materials. In a separate location we have woodworking and metal working, so it's really quite a range of activities."

There is also a lot of things planned for the Grand Opening celebration Wednesday afternoon.

"We plan to have a wide variety of things. Everything from music to 3D printing to active demonstrations, probably tearing some things apart," Blunt said. "Just anything to kind of keep the vibe and have fun in the space and use it for what we designed it to do."

The Grand Opening runs from 3:30 to 7:30 p.m. at 120 North Franklin Street.