The Kohl's Design It! Lab launched late last month at Discovery World, 500 N. Harbor Dr., and was an instant success, drawing, on its opening weekend, hundreds of people ready to get their hands dirty digging into the design and build process.
The Kohl's Design It! Lab -- funded with more than $2 million donated by Kohl's over the course of three years -- is built on a restaurant metaphor. Guests arrive, check in with the concierge and are seated at a table.
A server arrives with a menu of design and build projects and returns to take the order. Then, the nuts and bolts of the project arrive and the guests get to work creating their own little bracelets, toys, backpacks, holiday ornaments, small furniture or anything else from the available array.
The lab itself is a sight to see; a modern explosion of colors and shapes that feels like part kids TV show set, part state of the art laboratory and part sleek retail computer shop.
The debut weekend was, in CEO Joel Brennan's words, "experimental. We were still making a few tweaks."
But that made for an electric atmosphere.
"It was wild and wooly," adds Paul Krajniak, Discovery World's executive director. "It was packed with 350 people coming and going. People of all ages, families, teens, really liked this idea of becoming makers."
That wide net in terms of age groups, is key, says Brennan. Projects are available for all age groups.
"What's going on in here is the culmination of everything that's going on out there (in the exhibits)," says Joel Brennan, who points to the Les Paul exhibit on the other side of the wall from the design lab.
"Les (Paul) was really the patron saint of tinkerers; people who take everyday things and do something magical with them," says Brennan.
"This is a workshop for people to learn how to use tools, work with their hands and teach people to become inventors or at least open up that part of their being that is about that," says Brennan.
The lab is open to everyone who pays the basic D.W. admission and they get access to some state of the art rapid prototyping-style technology.
The items on the menu will constantly be changing and the menu will grow, with most simple projects taking about 30 to 45 minutes to complete. More advanced return visitors will be able to take on more challenging work, too. But even the most basic projects require some design work on the part of the guest.
"It's really about design," says Krajniak. "So, we're constantly moving you to understand that not only do you know how to use your hands, but when you connect those two things together, you can actually make products."
Discovery World is already working with area schools to bring students into the lab and get them designing with their imaginations and working with their hands to build the objects they see in their minds' eyes.
And Krajniak says the collaboration with educators is one of the main focuses of The Kohl's Design It! Lab.
"People of all ages like this idea of becoming makers," says Krajniak. "It's the spirit of can-do."
The Kohl's Design It! Lab is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. every Saturday and Sunday.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
