Cardboard Collaborative: A guide to creating more inclusive museum makerspaces.

Imagine a space filled with cardboard and endless possibilities where early engineering and creativity thrive. An inclusive makerspace that builds on design principles that work for a diversity of visitors and more museums. We’ve imagined that space over the past 10+ years, testing and iterating to make it a reality. Our iteration continues, and this guide shares some of the successes and challenges behind the Science Museum of Minnesota’s Cardboard City exhibition and our partnership with museums across the country through Cardboard Collaborative.

What’s in this guide? This guide has a little bit of everything for putting together a cardboard makerspace experience. Everyone should start by checking out the SMM Making Design Principles, as they are our signposts to everything that follows. Most sections, including this welcome page, share the ‘What’ - the key concepts or ideas, the ‘Why’ - the importance of those ideas to visitors or our colleagues, and the ‘How’ - the nuts and bolts to replicating pieces of our design and overall ethos.