Watershed are pleased to be partners in Assemble 2012: The Crafts Council conference taking place on Thursday 20 September at RIBA, London. The focus of the conference is on the contribution that craft makes to innovation and enterprise, and the relationship between making, science and technology.

We are currently seeing a massive transformation in materials and fabrication technology: not only the proliferation of new materials and composites, but also a radical reappraisal of ways of assembling, repairing, and even growing new materials. Propelled by current trends, this technology explosion presents a new world of potential for designers and makers, not just the new opportunities for the development of innovative forms, products and aesthetics, but also the fact that because the new developments are so radically different from their predecessors, the systems and processes underpinning them are being completely re-imagined.

Confirmed keynote speakers and contributors for Assemble 2012 include Clare Reddington, Director of iShed and The Pervasive Media Studio, David Gauntlett, Professor of Media and Communications at the University of Westminster and author of Making is Connecting, Rhian Solomon, Artist, Director and founder of the sKINship Research Project, and Ed Vaizey MP, Minister for Culture, Communications and the Creative Industries.

The conference is for: 

  • Makers interested in exploring how they can bring their specialist skills to science, engineering and high-end manufacturing industries.
  • Makers interested in new material and fabrication technologies and their impact across science, engineering and high-end manufacturing industries.
  • Organisations and individuals interested in the possibilities of collaboration with makers to drive forward innovation within science, engineering and high-end manufacturing industries.




Full details of speakers, sessions and a timetable for the day will be announced on the Assemble 2012 website shortly, tickets for Assemble can be bought here.

Assemble 2012 is presented by the Crafts Council in partnership with Caper, Crafts Magazine and Watershed.