Comment by probably_wrong
7 hours ago
I'd like to throw an idea to those who know better than I do.
Ever since I started living on my own I've lived in apartments, none of which had a backyard (one of them had a parking lot). None of my friends owns a house either. I'm the perfect customer for this and I'd love to do my own projects (two of which require a lathe!) but I simply don't have the space.
Is this just me? Or is the disappearance of the hobby garage a real phenomenon? A 3D printer is fairly limited in what it allows, but it also doesn't throw sawdust in the center of my living room.
This is generally what a makerspace is for. I don’t know what the (inter)national landscape is like for them, but I have a small 8’x8’ studio space at the makerspace in my city, which also has a full wood shop, metal shop, and tons of rapid prototyping tools (3d printers, vinyl cutter, etc). I live in a 1BR apartment downtown and the makerspace is in an industrial district that is a 5-minute bike ride away, and it’s basically my “garage”, just shared with 30 other studios and probably 200 non-studio members who come and go.
This is precisely what makerspaces are for.
There are many operating models. Some are attached to another organization (a library, a university), some are commercial (RIP Techshop), some are completely DIY and member-run. Any given city might have a handful of different ones, but you'll have to dig around and visit a few to see what you vibe with.
Caveat, it's very easy to get focused on the ooh-shiny tools, and forget to pay attention to the community energy and expectations. Some of the more professional spaces, you just pay for what you want, and staff takes care of the rest. At the other end of the scale, the fully-DIY places are very much a case of "you get out of it what you put into it", and may offer cheaper memberships but expect a lot more involvement.
Visit as many as you can.
The US is kind of "collapsing" in third spaces both public and private, but especially public due to funding cuts.