Some of our very best community partnerships are the ones that have grown and changed right alongside us.
Our relationship with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival is one of those and when I look back, I realize that relationship has really been built through people.
Rube Goldberg Camp
One of the earliest was Elib, who worked in OSF's prop shop and was also an early TMC supporter, instructor, and inspiration. In those early TMC days, he taught one of the most spectacular Rube Goldberg camps we've ever offered. The students created a machine that stretched across TWO classrooms, filled with gears, mechanics, movement, and general Rube Goldberg ridiculousness - and somehow ended with a Polaroid photo booth.
It was ambitious and creative and slightly bonkers.
In other words, very TMC.
Those early relationships laid the groundwork for something much bigger.
When Community Needed All of Us
In 2020, our relationship with OSF suddenly took on a very different purpose.
During the earliest days of COVID, TMC (and other local makers, engineers, and manufacturers) worked to help local hospitals and healthcare providers access desperately needed PPE and prototype medical equipment. Suddenly, 3D printers weren't just fun tools for making - they were part of our community's emergency response.
And OSF had 3D printers.
Even better, they had talented people who knew how to use them.
Annette and the OSF team jumped in alongside us, putting their prop shop expertise and equipment to work as we prototyped and produced parts for local healthcare providers. Their willingness to share their skills and resources was integral to helping us respond quickly when our healthcare community needed it most. (Annette later worked with us as an instructor during our summer camps).
3D printed ventilator caps
Then came the Almeda Fire.
While TMC hosted the mutual aid station here in Talent (with Rogue Climate and Rogue Action Center), OSF's Carpenter Hall in Ashland became an important hub for logistics and donations for fire survivors. Once again, our organizations found ourselves working alongside one another - helping to move desperately needed supplies out into the community and into the hands of our mutual aid partners.
I remember that time as exhausting and scary - but also as an extraordinary example of what can happen when organizations stop worrying about whose "job" something is and simply ask:
What do we have, what do you have, and how can we use it together to help?
That spirit has stayed at the heart of our relationship with OSF ever since.
Almeda Fire Aid Station (2020)
From 3D Printers to Forklifts
Screenprinting with Sacramento Country Day Students (2023)
Thankfully, our collaborations these days are generally a little less urgent.
Sometimes partnership looks like big, creative ideas.
And sometimes it looks like calling your friends at OSF because you have something VERY heavy that needs moving and they have a forklift.
That's community too.
Our connection with OSF has also created some unexpected opportunities. Since 2023, students from Sacramento Country Day School have visited TMC as part of their trips to Ashland to experience OSF. After taking in the incredible creativity happening on stage, they get to come into our makerspace and do some creating of their own.
I love that connection. Theater, art, design, engineering, making. Creativity doesn't have to stay neatly inside one discipline.
And now, another set of wonderful OSF humans is helping us take this partnership in a whole new direction.
Art to Action: Crafting Community
This time it's Tara and Kirsten from OSF's education team, who have been working alongside us to dream up our latest collaboration.
On September 26, TMC and OSF are joining forces for Art to Action: Crafting Community with Talent Maker City and the Midsummer Mechanicals.
Inspired by the Mechanicals in A Midsummer Night's Dream and the long, long history of humans coming together to make art—from cave paintings and rock glyphs to pageant wagons and community murals—we'll be gathering people from the OSF company, TMC, and our broader community to make something together.
And this one is going to be FUN.
We'll be taking a hands-on dive into weaving, exploring not only the physical act of weaving materials together, but what it means to weave ourselves into community.
Because really, isn't that what this whole partnership has been?
Different people bringing different skills, materials, experiences, and ideas and figuring out what we can create when we put them all together.
The Thread That Connects It All
I've been thinking about the arc of this partnership as we prepare for September.
It began for us with people like Elib sharing their creativity and expertise when TMC was still very young. It grew through Annette and others sharing equipment and skills when our healthcare community needed help. We stood alongside one another during the Almeda Fire. We've borrowed equipment with the help of Tasia, shared expertise, connected students with creativity, and yes, occasionally called each other when something ridiculously heavy needed moving.
And now Tara and Kirsten are helping us bring the relationship full circle - back to gathering people together to simply make art.
I love that.
Because partnerships aren't really between organizations. They're between people.
They're built when someone says yes to teaching a wonderfully over-the-top Rube Goldberg camp. When someone turns on a 3D printer because a hospital needs help. When someone moves supplies after a wildfire. When someone lends a forklift. And when a couple of creative educators sit down together and say, Okay, what could we make together next?
I'm incredibly grateful for all the OSF humans who have been part of our story over the years – and really excited about this next chapter.
I hope you'll join us September 26. Come weave something, meet some wonderful people, and help us keep crafting community together.
With gratitude (and probably some amazing fabric),
Alli
Thanks for being part of our story and community - together we're building a more connected, creative, and resilient place through hands-on making.
Jo French, teacher at Sacramento Country Day + Alli French
Stories from inside Talent Maker City
Making Headlines is where we share a closer look at the people, projects, and partnerships that bring Talent Maker City to life. From youth makers discovering new skills to community collaborations and creative projects in our makerspace, these stories highlight the impact of hands-on learning and community connection.
