Membership: Our community of makers continues to grow, usually with individual members, more students and now an entire business. Johnson Custom Upholstery relocated and will operate their entire furniture, auto, and boat upholstery business inside IRM. The Hibbing High School First Robotics Team lined up eight bright students to build and program a robot at the Makerspace; this year, they had to build their own playing field as competition at the DECC was cancelled. Six Itasca Community College Engineering students joined IRM to build their Spring semester projects. And every semester, IRM welcomes new students in the Iron Range Engineering Bell Program from around the nation; IRM has enjoyed the diversity students bring to our space­. 
 
Maintenance: IRM members built a small paint booth for interior use of spray paints and a 3’ x 4’ light table, quite handy for tracing patterns. Recently, IRM installed LED lighting throughout all workshop spaces, greatly improving the visibility for fine work.
 
Unique: The Hibbing T-shirt factory closed at the end of 2020 and sold its trophy and engraving business to Andrew Hanegmon, owner of the Iron Range Makerspace. The result has been a steady increase in foot traffic as customers request customized memorial plaques, engraved plates, recognition pieces, and trophies for anything from sports teams to company recognition or neighborhood deer hunting competitions. Andrew has enjoyed learning the business and experimenting with ways of moving into the high-tech tools available at IRM such as the 3D printer, laser, CNC router, and CNC plasma cutter. 
 
The IRM website now links to a greatly expanded assortment of awards and promotional items which may be purchased in large or small quantities - on demand. IRM offers prompt production of customized cups, gavels, glasses, mugs, pens, ornaments, thermoses, cutting boards, card holders, travel cases, paper weights, mouse pads, kitchen and cigar or wine accessories as well as traditional plaques, awards, trophies, and more right here in Hibbing. Engraving may be done on glass, crystal, acrylic, metal, wood or leather. Follow this link to see more: https://www.ironrangemakerspace.com/trophy-makingengraving.html
 
Workshops: Introductory workshops continue to be attractive to new members. Basic skills classes have included frame making, basic welding, and the always-popular blacksmithing and knife making classes. Even more popular is “Deep Fried Friday” where members experiment with meats, vegetables, and even desserts in the deep fat fryer in our commercial kitchen. With IRM’s large spaces, members are able to create in all areas of IRM and still observe COVID guidelines. Even our main dining table is large at 17 feet in length; we definitely look forward to the day it again seats 20!  
 
Hours: 11:00 am to 11:00 pm, Wednesday thru Saturday or 12:00 pm to 9:00 pm Sunday
 
Contact: Andrew Hanegmon, ironrangemakerspace@gmail.com, 218-966-1192, www.ironrangemakerspace.com.