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The Scott Family Amazeum's Maker in Residence Program introduces talented, creative makers to Northwest Arkansas and the creative culture that already exists in the region.  Makers from across the nation with unique skills, visions, and mindsets find a home at the Amazeum where they become part of the family. Amanda Willshire, the latest Amazeum Maker in Residence, moved in and got to work with the team who supported her with time, talent and tools as she worked on a piece of interactive public art.

This year's Tinkerfest could easily have been a multi-day "Tinker Festival" largely due to the quality and quantity of makers in attendance. The Amazeum's Makers in Residence Program provided the impetus for a whole new level of making and tinkering. Five talented, diverse makers from across the country came to Northwest Arkansas to collaborate with our team, interface with guests and the community. Their presence at our 5th Tinkerfest exponentially raised the creativity level at the Amazeum and in the region.

Maker ecosystems grow out of a need for people to collaborate, communicate, create, and learn together. The first seeds are often planted by a small group of passionate makers and educators working to impact learning, economic development, culture, and the overall quality of life in a community by building a network of creatives with diverse specialties. The Scott Family Amazeum is working to nurture a maker ecosystem in the fertile conditions of Northwest Arkansas through a Maker in Residence Program and fact-finding trips to established maker ecosystems in other cities supported by a grant from the Walton Family Foundation.  

Creative Collaboration, Cranky Contraptions, and the Rise of Mega-automata Most people who know about automata think about them as small, human-powered contraptions in a box in which gears, cams, levers, and pulleys automate a clever little vignette. At least that was their experience with the Amazeum's exhibition of Curious Contraptions created by Cabaret Mechanical Theater in London, England. However, the latest Amazeum Maker in Residence, Ryan Jenkins, thinks automata can be so much more. And bigger, way, way bigger.

In the three years since we opened, we’ve had an incredible response from our community. In fact, 805,531 incredible responses from guests who visited the museum to play and learn with us. Saturday, July 15, hundreds of community members came out to help us celebrate our 3rd birthday with some gooey, sticky, hands-on family fun.

Amazeum Program Educators Support Future Teachers

What binds a creative community together?Masking tape . . . lots and lots of masking tape. At least that worked during the last week of June. Danny Scheible, creator of Tapigami, spent the week as a Maker in Residence at the Scott Family Amazeum as part of the Maker in Residence Program funded by the Walton Family Foundation. Scheible resided in the 3M Tinkering Hub and introduced hundreds of guests to Tapigami, which he calls the “art of applying imagination to tape” during daily workshops.

Building a Creative Community by Making a MousetrapThe Amazeum hosted Mark Perez, Rose Hardin and their troupe of builder/performers - "fungineers"- as part the Maker in Residence Program funded by the Walton Family Foundation. This program is designed to bring national and regional makers together to support creating experiences at the intersection of science, technology, engineering and art. "The idea behind this is to be able to bring in incredibly creative people to infuse great ideas into the Amazeum and our community," Amazeum Executive Director Sam Dean says.

The Scott Family Amazeum hosted makers from across Arkansas for the 2nd Arkansas Maker Summit on Monday, October 16th. Representatives from over 30 K – 12 and post-secondary schools, the local artist and entrepreneurial community spent the day collaborating and learning about how to continue the growth of the maker ecosystem in Arkansas.

Adults went back to school Friday, August 18, when they enrolled in Amazeum on the Rocks: High School Flashback.