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Writer's pictureGabrielle Bossy

Creation of the Yorkville Hippie Haven: A generally chaotic post

So maybe I’ve gone off the deep end a little bit on this project but since it brings the distinct possibility of failure- I think I might go for it…or at least a version of it. I also realized that I totally stole the term Hippie Haven from a CBC documentary I watched once upon a time so I’ll have to think of something better.


Last week in my Interactive Exhibit Design course we experimented with combining Makey Makey with Makedo and Max Gen 6 (basically, a computer thingy that can make lots of different things into a mouse and keyboard, some fancy plastic fasteners that let you make almost anything and a computer software program made by musicians). My group members and I created a drum kit using these three things and some cardboard where when the sticks (wood covered in tinfoil) came in contact with the tinfoil drums, the computer program would play a drum sound. It sounds (and ok…it looks) rudimentary but when you consider that we did it in about twenty minutes, it’s pretty nifty if you ask me. Here’s a photo.


Anyways. These three things together work in a pretty cool way and I took special interest in Makedo once I checked out all the different and cool projects that people have made with these tiny little doo-dads (that’s not the technical term). Here’s just a few cool one’s I found online.




Okay keep those in mind while I shift to the second part and then the combination.


You might remember last week when I talked about trying to make my own turntable. Since then, my professor sent me a home made turntable YouTube video made out of Lego Mindstorms, a cup and a pin. It’s pretty cool. I checked it out and the instructions aren’t great but maybe I could figure it out.

Then while I was looking through make-do projects I found this bad boy which uses a pizza box, pin, paper and makedo to create a gramaphone!

It’s pretty simplistic and silly looking but if you painted it up really cool I think it has potential! Still…it seems a little too simple and since the main instructions for this class are not to play it safe I’ve decided I will make it part of a much…MUCH larger makedo project.


I want to create a hippie haven that showcases the music of 1960s Yorkville music scene and looks a little bit like a coffee house inside. If possible, I will model it after the infamous Riverboat coffeehouse (the one from the Neil Young song, of course) although research is quite sparse so this might be pretty tricky. I’d like to have layar-activated posters inside that when scanned play videos from famous concerts of sixties musicians. Another possibility here would be to have sensors that activate it. I’ll try to explore my best options. With beaded curtains, some historical information and maybe the odd meditation pillow it should be pretty cool if not a little crowded inside. I want it to be an interactive, fun and educational project that appeals to my main research interests! Of couse, it will be topped off with some kind of home made turntable or gramophone. Hopefully it works.


That’s all for now but you’ll have updates on how all this is going soon I’m sure!


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