workshop

"Boost Membership Update"

With our new Boost membership application going live last week we wanted to share a post that has kindly been written by one of our Boost members, Gabriele, who joined us in October 2022. It sounds like she’s been having a great time learning about the equipment in the space. She has also been collaborating with some of our members and sharing her knowledge with us.


A close up photo of an intricate laser etching of what looks like a hand-drawn dragon. The very narrow depth of field causes the top and bottom of the image to be blurred leaving only the centre in focus.In October I was so lucky to win the boost membership for DoES Liverpool. It has granted me access to a number of wonderful machines and more importantly to many incredible people. Everyone in the DoES community has expertise in some field and they are more than eager to share it with anyone interested. Everything in DoES is set up by the community members so anyone can ask and learn about the inner workings of laser cutters, 3D printers, CNC mills or knitting machines, and get involved in calibrating and maintaining the equipment.

I have been using the laser cutters to make beautiful engravings on wood. I like making intricate designs that resemble an ink drawing and using different settings on the laser cutter to replicate the pen stroke effect.

A screenshot of a 3D design software showing a four legged creature with a long segmented torso, almost resembling a caterpillar, with two spindly arms.I have also met a number of people involved in game development. I am now designing characters for a hobby game project, as well as building a demo training platform in VR for a security company. I have recreated the Tapestry building where DoES is currently housed to use in our demonstration.

DoES is a perfect place to find exciting opportunities and learn new skills, I would recommend it to absolutely everyone.


Thanks Gabby for the great post! We’re glad you’re having such a fulfilling time at DoES Liverpool and look forward to your continued involvement.

For everyone reading this post who thinks this sounds like somewhere you would like to spend more time, we have a weekly Maker Night on Thursday evenings from 6pm and a monthly Maker Day on the second Saturday from 10am-5pm. These are free sessions you can drop in to and have a look around the space or get started on a project. You can also come in any time and have your first day free if you bring cake or snacks to share! Finally, as mentioned above we have just opened applications for the April 2023 Boost Membership, so sign up if you’re interested in six months free access to DoES Liverpool!

"Announcing our new home, and DoES membership!"

It’s been over 3 months since I last posted something about DoES Liverpool’s plan to move, and what a busy time it’s been. We’ve firmed up our plans to move and we’ve also managed to get some new people signed up so that we can be a lot happier about being able to afford what is looking like an exciting expansion of the DoES Liverpool coworking space and workshop. We actually announced this in person during our birthday party and have dropped quite obvious hints and mentions on Twitter, but somehow posting it to our blog feels more official. I am very happy to be able to announce:

DoES Liverpool is moving to The Tapestry, a newly renovated classic building in what will soon be known as The Fabric District.

This move should be a great new start for DoES Liverpool as we work through our seventh year. DoES Liverpool will be always be DoES Liverpool, but with double the floor space we’ll be able to do that much more. We will have a bigger, better events space; multiple meeting rooms; quiet corners to take a call and a nice space to hang out, drink coffee* and have a chat. While still offering the best coworking and workshop facilities in the city! (* other beverages are available)

The Fabric District is across the city between London Road and Islington. The map below illustrates our old location (red) and the new (green), we’ve also highlighted Lime Street Station to show the great transport links we’ll continue to have in our new location.

Jason Abbott, one of the owners of the Tapestry, and a number of other stakeholders are really pushing to develop the area into a great place to live and make things. They’re trying to do it in such a way that doesn’t push out the great people who are already running businesses there now, hoping to embrace their work and bring more people, and customers, into the area!

They’re still working to finish the building, and once that’s finished we then need to get in and get the space ready for our own purposes. We’re expecting to have the keys at the beginning of January and will then work to get the space ready as fast as possible. We’re working on the plans for this but we’re really hopeful to get things done as fast as possible and to be in by February.

The move to a new space is such a large change for DoES Liverpool, our first move in over 6 years, so this seems like an obvious time to make some changes to our pricing structure.

One key thing we’re doing is making membership an official thing. We’re ever thankful to Francis Irving for suggesting the “Friends of DoES” scheme and now we’re bringing that in as part of our pricing model. If you setup a monthly £10 payment then you are considered a “Friend of DoES”, we truly appreciate the people that do this and we know that people like having this option to signal their support for DoES Liverpool and our mission to support a vibrant community of makers in Liverpool. See this page for how to sign up.

This restructure does mean increasing our standard prices but we’re going to take this opportunity to offer discounts on these prices to our members as well. The larger size of the new venue and the ability to offer 24/7 access means we can add a few more services to the list as you’ll see below:

 

Description Price Member Price
Single Day
(Workshop* or Desk)
£12/day £10/day
Out of Hours Workshop £35/month £25/month
Monthly Workshop £65/month £50/month
Flexidesk £80/month £70/month
Monthly desk £180/month £165/month
Registered Address/Mailbox £99/year £79/year
Storage per cubic feet per month £3 £3

* – Gerald surcharge of £2/usage still applies

There’s a few new things on that list I can tell you about. The first is the “Flexidesk” option. This is somewhere between the hot desk day and the full monthly desk option. We really want it to allow people to pop in for short periods without having to stress about paying a half day for a few hours, or rushing out before their half day turns into a full day. It’s similar to our “all you can eat, but don’t take the mickey” workshop option that lets you come and go as you please but reflects the fact that we expect Flexidesk users to be in more often. We’re not going to be stressing about how often you’re in and we don’t want you to either, we just want to see more of you!

We’re now splitting the workshop offering into two, one for people who are likely to be in during the daytime and one for people who are more likely to be in “out of hours”. We’d expect this to be like peak and off-peak and have priced it accordingly, it’ll be interesting to see what changes when we have much extended opening hours.

Finally, we’ve come up with a price to cover general storage. We’re hoping this works out and is a fair price, considering our biggest outlay is rent – i.e the physical space – we really need to be able to recoup that cost and if you’re storing stuff at DoES you’re definitely making use of the space. All of the monthly costs already include some storage but if you find you need more, you can now pay us for it!

These price changes will help to make sure we can cover the running costs but getting the space ready in the first place and getting everything moved over is going to stretch our current finances so we’re also planning to run a crowdfunding drive to help us to cover that. There’ll be more information once we have a better idea of the costs involved.

We’re keeping the old prices until we move into the Tapestry but if you want to take advantage of the Flexidesk option you can do that straight away, just get in touch at hello@doesliverpool.com! Similarly if you have any questions about the move please get in touch. There’s so much more to tell about this story and we will continue to update you but hopefully we can alleviate any concerns you might have.

Finally lets close out with the current plan for room layout and some photos from within the (unfinished) space. This layout isn’t final yet and the furniture shown is just a guide but it’s still an exciting glimpse at the future capabilities of DoES Liverpool!

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