A very belated recap of the fourth annual Chicago Northside Mini Maker Faire, a wonderful day for Chicago’s largest celebration of learning, STEAM, and whimsy!
Outside, all sorts of wonderful makers showed off their skills. The weather couldn’t have been more perfect.
The Official Schurz High School NHS Ice Creamery
Mostly Harmless Arms set up a shooting gallery for people to try out their amazing blasters. The Chicago Children’s Museum’s Tinkering Lab had adults and kids make amazing “Cardboard Mechanisms.” Some were as tall as a person!
Schurz introduced its newest food science program, with a Geodesic Green House and a Vertical Farm! Come visit Schurz now and see the Food Science Lab in action.
We welcomed the return of the amazing Robots with Trossen Robotics, and drones from Mad Lab Industries.
UAV’s and Robotic platforms from Mad Lab Industries
And we feasted on food trucks: Aztec Dave’s Cocina Mexicana and Paris Ouh La La. Tasty tacos and crepes!
Inside were all sorts of maker mischief! Chicago Electronic Distributors showed off various built kits, including the “Useless Machine” from Spikenzie Lab.
Down the hall, the Interactive Art Booth displayed incredible artworks and also showed people how to make origami cicadas with LED lights. . One piece was a robot hanging on the wall that had a microphone to pick up sound waves. Colors changed on the robot depending on sound levels. Yes, you could yell at it! Or clap! Sing! Neat-o. 
Nearby, the Schurz Nickelodeon showed student made films. Mid-Faire, the projector broke, and we got to see the team making it work! What a way to show the true maker spirit!
Schurz pre-engineers encouraged folks to build bridges to see how much weight they could hold. Friends challenged each other to build stronger bridges! The pre-engineers also build the underwater ROVs in the pool and the crate stacking robot that competed in the FIRST Robotics Competition.
Underwater ROVs from Schurz Pre-engineering Program
Schurz FIRST robot
Upstairs in the cafeteria, we had a giant Purple Dalek wandering around! But don’t worry, he seemed friendly.
Hackerspaces Pumping Station: One, SouthSide Hackerspace: Chicago, Workshop 88, and Chibots brought so much awesome! And also for the first time, we hosted the Dumb Robot Competition for Dummies.
From Workshop 88: minion motion sensors in action
From SSH:Chicago, swirling, ever swirling.
From PS:One, the ever popular solder-less Noise-O-Tron
From Chibots, line following minibots
Students from elementary school, high school, after-school, and college showed off incredible creativity and amazing projects! The Schurz Gay Straight Alliance taught folks to design and make their own buttons, as well as bristle-bots. IB students showcased paper mache projects, nail art, and skateboard designs. The Schurz Anime Club came in full force, teaching the culture, the craft and the technology behind anime. Student artwork included packing-tape self-sculptures, circuits printed on cloth, and walking robots! Lily Born showed talked about her journey inventing the Kangaroo Cup… Plus so much more!!!
Students at The Laboratory taught others how to make bath balls.
UIC demonstrated interactive origami, along with a slew of other cool projects at the intersection of art, design, and technology.
From Schurz High School and the Columbia College After School Program, a truly Colossal Squid! Wow!
Build-a-Blinkie was busy as always with tons of folks making LED pins. One girl made a Christmas tree of lights. There was just so much to do!
Thanks again to everyone who came out! We hope to see you all again soon for the fifth annual Chicago Northside Mini Maker Faire!
Special thanks to Drew Fustini, Elisa Shoenberger, Sam Carpenter, and Kristi Dula for sharing these and more wonderful photos. If you took some kicking pictures of the fourth annual CNS Maker Faire, please share with us @CNSmakerfaire and on Facebook!
