By Coby Unger, Senior Shop Manager
It is widely known that Olin’s ethos leans heavily on hands-on engineering education, and that is in sharpest focus when you walk through the shop spaces. President May calls the shop “Olin’s Sacred Cow” and professor Alessandra Ferzoco has called it the “Beating Heart of the College.” We are energized and inspired daily by the spirit and enthusiasm that students bring to the shops.
The shops at Olin are a place where students, staff, and faculty can learn to make and build whatever their heart desires. Over the years, The Shop has expanded from two rooms for welding and for machining to now encompassing nearly the entire first floor of the MAC.
“I love making things in the shop because there are so many opportunities to grow my experience and expertise. It is not just a place of learning, but one of exploration and opportunity. I have a long term project of building a train simulator using original parts and I’ve been using the shop to restore the parts I have and build the ones I don’t.” -Sam '28
In these spaces, we have machines for everything from 3D printing to wood working, to soldering to precision machining, and may things in between. We have more machines per student than any other college in a recent survey conducted by Professor and Director of Shops and Labs, Daniela Faas, but more important than that is machine access and trainings. The Shops run over 500 machine trainings per year with an average of 3 participants in each training and nearly all of these trainings are run for students and run by our student shop assistants. The shops not only support classes, but also clubs, co-curriculars, independent studies, passionate pursuits, and personal hobbyist projects.
“I’ve been using the shops for cutting vinyl records. It’s amazing to have the opportunity to use machines without a reason beyond personal curiosity.” -Mika '27
Over the summer, Olin was given two grants specifically for The Shops. The new Cernosia Family Wood Shop and Harris Studio are the results of these two generous gifts. Nearly every decision made in the Olin Shop is driven by two factors, curricular need, and student feedback, and the conception of these new spaces are no different.
The original wood shop at Olin was built inside a retrofitted storage closet, and was heavily used by students first for personal projects and for prototyping and more recently for a popular wood sculpture class called Form Space Grain run by The Shop’s own Dyllan Nguyen. It was clear that we had long outgrown the small space. With the help of our 4 summer student fellows, the shop team was able to transform a classroom into a full professional-grade wood shop. The new space features a new jointer, planer, thickness sander, lathe, table saw and dust collection system to complement all the existing equipment moved from the old space. Additionally, we were able to increase the number of work benches from 1 to 6, eliminating the need to do hand tool work in the hallway.
“I’ve experienced engineering education at many different institutions, but the shop makes Olin unique because of all the hands on experience. This experience makes me a better engineer because now I think about how each part will be made not just how it should work. From the perspective of the Formula team, it is impressive that our small team can make so many of our parts in house without relying on outside suppliers.” -Kefan '28
The Harris Studio and Harris Classroom were built to support Olin’s most prototyping-heavy classes such as Principals of Integrated Engineering (PIE) and Mechanical Prototyping (MechProto). Conveniently located between the electronics studio and 3D printing studio, this new space is fully stocked with hand tools and small machines for prototyping and assembly. While these tools have always been available on campus, there has never been centralized and managed space to house these needs. Envisioned as a “supercharged classroom” the space will help support any of Olin’s prototyping needs for classes, clubs, independent projects, or just for the joy of making things.
Both the Cernosia Family Wood Shop and Harris Studio were officially opened during a ribbon cutting on Family and Alumni Weekend, they both felt most alive on Fall Gathering with events first happening in both spaces.
“Through working on the food processor in DJS I get to see the work we do in the shops and its impact expand beyond when it implemented in Ghana.” -Andrea '26
While makerspaces are common these days at engineering schools, Olin's Shop continues to separate itself as a unique outlet for learning, growth, and exploration. Learn more about the shop here.