After year break and excited from celebrating the first 10 years since the opening of the first Fab Lab in Italy, Maker Faire Torino comes back with a new location, the Padiglione 3 of Torino Esposizioni. Designed byr Ettore Sotssass Sr and Pierluigi Nervi, this late 40s postindustrial, ferrocement jewel sits in the heart of Valentino Parco, along the Po river. Maker Faire Torino will take place this coming weekend, June 4th and 5th and bring together a wide variety of makers and drive forward the conversation about the role of makers in the future.
Also this year the Circular Economy is one of the central themes of the Torino Maker Faire. After all, it could not be otherwise: the circular economy involves sharing, lending, reusing, repairing, reconditioning and recycling existing materials and products for as long as possible; it involves technology, innovation and the idea of the future
This year event is still supported by Turin Chamber of Commerce and is twinned with Share Festival, a digital art exhibition event held on the same dates in the venue. The team at Re.Te machines, a group of makers active within the Sermig’s wings, are driving the event this year and firmly focused on the open source ethic of the maker community. Funded in 1981 from, among others, Giorgio Ceragioli and Rinado Canalis, this ethic has always underlined the meaning of technology, producing (besides the vast amount of donations and charities) a peculiar list of bizarre and useful machines some of which are not open-source / downloadable / reproducible on the internet. These machines all have a history of resilience, fighting the “planned obsolescence” Ugo Vallauri (one of supporters of the event) from Restart Projects often warns producers about. This design approach may reflect on the hardware (capacitors beat batteries) or on the way knowledge is spread in the population where the device is installed.
Below are a quick selection of the machines that truly amazed the Maker Faire Torino team. Hats off to Roberto Verzino (the smiling guy in most pictures) a firmware specialist and the maker leading the team. Read more about their work HERE.
Electronic Water Bottle
Electronic bottle for water disinfection using UVC ultraviolet rays. It can be recharged from a common mobile phone charger or from a small photovoltaic panel. With a full refill it can disinfect 3 liters of water (each 0.5l cycle). It is equipped with electronic control for notifications to visually impaired and hearing impaired users.
Clean Water From the Sun
Reverse osmosis filtration powered by photovoltaics without the need for electric accumulators. Used to extract heavy metals, such as arsenic, from polluted waters.
TEG - Thermoelectric Generator
Electric generator based on the exchange of heat between two surfaces at different temperatures.
Suitable for generating energy, for example to illuminate a house where a stove is on and photovoltaics cannot be used due to the overcast sky, as in the winters of Eastern Europe.
Iced-walled Photovoltaic Fridge
Study and construction of fridges and freezers powered by photovoltaic energy and without electric batteries. Prototypes are being built for the start of autonomous production in Africa, the result of in-depth studies and tests to achieve excellent energy efficiency (3 days of cold without power) and robustness for use in difficult contexts.
There's more...
Another hosts of the event, as seen as Maker Faire Rome, is Marco Bozzola, a serial crowdfunder that is going to bring his new creations as well as telling his story / sharing his experiences as a multiple kickstarter entrepreneur.
#Tomakerfaire is hosting several research laboratories and academics, such as the Idrakronos H2Polito Team (Polytechnic of Turin) and ITS Education.
Kids Activities promoted by Future Makers and many drones activities, as well as the Leonerd Quattro Cavaglieri Flipper.
