You create with your community not for it. Get citizens involved from the beginning, ownership is a continuant process; don’t reduce your community to just being guests.

»Do it yourself« is important, but »Do it together« even more so. It is in the community and its net-work, that you create and share your ideas.

Create opportunities for engagement on diverse levels, people commit themselves in di� erent ways.

Focus on learning as some-thing you do with your hands; skills are created by making, touching and participating.

Have di� erent thresholds for your activities; make some for novices, and some for experts.Defi ne and stage your activities

and initiatives so citizens easily can see what’s going on. But be willing to change and expand so ideas aren’t limited.

Don’t clean up all the time. Creativity and new ideas come from chaos and a little mess.

Sta� over stu� . People are more important than technology and machines.

Put yourself in the game. Lead by example and don’t be afraid to make mistakes. Use your own personal skills and creativity.

Remember: You don’t need a makerspace to work with maker-culture.

The Clout of the makermovement is defi ned by its community.

Challenges libraries strategic and managerial capacity for innovation

− It requires innovative leadership to support innovation.

− It requires leadership to choose a direction.

− The role of sta� changes from per-forming services to actively engaging citizens.

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People’s Labs in LibrariesIf the growth of welfare is to continue, innova-tion from citizens and communities is demanded. People’s Lab has for the last two years been ex-perimenting with initiatives that will support the new requirements and skills on demand: critical thinking, problem solving, creativity, innovation, communication and collaboration. Making or the makermovement seems to be a trend or ap-proach to learning that encourages this. Lessons learned from our project are passed on here as inspiration for working with making in libraries.

Read more about the project at www.folkelab.dk.

People’s LabDuring the project six di� erent Innovationspaces, also called people’s labs, have been created. The labs have been created locally, respectively in Aarhus and Roskilde, and on the basis of local needs. Creating together with the local community has been central to the project. It has resulted in six innovation spaces, all of them tem-porary: TechLab, Wastelab, GuitarLab, Maker Space in Dream City at Roskilde Festival 2013, Magnetic Groove Memories and Aarhus Mini Maker Faire. Read more about the di� erent labs at www.folkelab.dk.

OrganisationThe project is created in collaboration between the Main Library Aarhus, Roskilde Libraries, University of Aarhus and Roskilde University, Open Space Aarhus and INSP! The project is supported by the Danish Agency for Cul-ture’s Development Pool for Public and School Libraries.

Contributes to activities that provide public value by stim-ulating the development of network, skills and innovation

− Networking creates ideas, knowledge and growth for the individual.

− Mutual learning from, and with, local experts increases the overall level of knowledge in the community.

− Access to new opportunities, new technologies, and new ways of using, what we already know is the basis for innovation.

Increases the social value of libraries, as public spaces that bridge between di� erent communities and knowledge domains

− Media, space and people make the library a diverse institution that stim-ulates and inspires.

− Making new connections and net-working are the basis for personal and social growth.

− Making is closely connected to creativity, and skills are developed by doing, touching and participating.

Contributes to the libraries’ relationship with its local community

− The library is a resourceful, fl exible partner that gains strength by giving control of library activities to citizens.

− The library becomes a local driver for cooperation and civic engagement.

− The Library becomes an amplifi er for ressources and network already exist-ing in the local community.

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