The Making of Women: Creating Trajectories for Women’s Participation in Makerspaces

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This paper investigates how making activities and participation in makerspaces supports the wellbeing and empowerment of women, particularly in making domains that are typically male-dominated. We spent six months undertaking participant observations in a women-only makerspace that runs workshops aimed at teaching women skills in using power tools and woodwork. We conducted contextual interviews with 12 workshop attendees as well as with the makerspace founder and lead instructor. Through the lens of feminist HCI and legitimate peripheral participation, we present trajectories of participation within a women-only makerspace – from beginning as a peripheral participant to becoming a competent and confident maker. We found that through structured workshops in a women-only space that actively teach making skills, the women-only makerspace works to transform the current makerspace landscape so more women can engage with these spaces and participate within them. We contribute three core qualities to foster participation: women-only but without a ‘feminist’ label, configuring a formal and collaborative learning environment, and reification through artefacts. Collectively these work towards new configurations of makerspaces for women that enable their participation within them, and we detail how such configurations work to create trajectories for women’s participation.