Hong Kong’s best kept secrets: the workshops at MakerBay, and how they help inventive children realise their ideas
Watch: collaborative workspaces in Yau Tong and Central hold classes to teach children the basics of skills such as woodwork, bookbinding, metalwork, laser cutting and 3D printing
Children may be full of bright and imaginative ideas, but in Hong Kong few of them get access to the space, skills or the right tools to bring them to life. Now, however, there is a place in the city designed to nurture their innovative minds: MakerBay.
Founded last year, MakerBay is a collaborative workspace stocked with all sorts of tools and equipment, so inventors, engineers and designers alike can make use of them to realise their ideas.
It isn’t just a playground for adults; MakerBay also hosts different classes for children at its headquarters in Yau Tong and opened a smaller but more accessible workshop at PMQ in Central in October.
There are induction classes on subjects such as woodwork, bookbinding, metalwork, laser cutting and 3D printing, where children have access to large-scale equipment not normally found in homes or schools. The fees start from HK$250 per class and include all the material costs.