b-ing Design
A collaborative way of making
TMDC
With so many question marks hanging over the economy and our global supply chains now is the right time to start thinking outside the box. One of the lessons learned from the Covid-19 Pandemic must surely be that we need to start making things locally again. That we cannot rely on importing everything we need. This is just as important for essentials like food and medical equipment as for non-essential items. When it come to design TMDC, Taller para la Materialización y el Desarrollo de (grandes) Conceptos (workshop for making and developing concepts) provides a possible way forward. Described as a Shared Machine Shop the TMDC initiative could be described as a cooperative or a co-working for makers.
Having started in 2016 within a shared premises of 300sq.m. located in the Poblenou neighbourhood with its rich heritage of industrial manufacturing, TMDC soon outgrew that location and was offered a long term lease by the Hospital Sant Pau on a much larger premises, previously lying vacant. Now accommodated within a precinct of industrial warehouses which once provided all the laundry services for the nearby Hospital Sant Pau, and include 2,000 sq.m. located in La Verneda neighbourhood. The buildings themselves are excellent examples of rationalist 1950s architecture with strip windows and brick facades. Providing large open plan spaces within for all the shared equipment that includes 3D printers, metal working machinery, specialist painting facilities, carpentry etc.
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At TMDC the primary commitment lies in the creation of sustainable local production that offers optimum quality. The idea is that if a designer or other user needs to manufacture their own design of a table, exhibition display, lamp or other object, at TMDC they can commission a member of the team to produce the piece. Or if the project is larger in scale a TMDC manager a be put in charge of supervising the entire manufacturing process up to delivery.
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The project managers of TMDC have coordinated the work processes to make it easier for large companies like Media Pro to manufacture the tables for their offices by local manufacturers and proximity through its members.
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Rather like a modern day Fitzcarraldo the figure behind this initiative is Pedro Pineda (entrepreneur and designer) founder and current coordinador of TMDC. He first got involved with the Open Design City when he lived in Berlin - an initiative known asthe TechShop movement in the US, over a decade ago. He subsequently went about introducing it to Spain. Pedro has been working in design and shared fabrication spaces for over 7 years (makerlab, betahaus, TMDC) as well as co-living spaces (El Pinitoocho). He heads a team of architects, designers, entrepreneurs and craftspeople who lend their expertise to the project.
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“We want to make it easier for both those who start (and cannot buy the machines) and those who need specific tools at any given time (and do not have them at their disposal) to access these shared resources and thus manufacture without limitations.”
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A completed project made at TMDC
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A completed project made at TMDC
- TMDC
- Polígon industrial de Montsolís
- Rambla de Prim, 258,
- 08020 Barcelona
- www.tmdc.es