VIVISTOP Telliskivi autumn season 2019
Yay, VIVISTOP Telliskivi, our studio for kids to realize their wild innovative ideas, has been operational for more than 1 year! We’re so proud of all the cool projects the kids have done. During this period, we have organized 50+ events and workshops. To get to know what we did during our first 6 months, take a walk down memory lane of our first season.
Now, let’s check out what has happened during the autumn season.
Inspirational Workshops
As technology has become such a big part of our lives, it is essential for children to know how to express themselves with it and how they themselves can be the creators and masters of it. Over a period of 10 weeks, we organized workshops for kids to get familiar with tech. One of the formats for this was exclusively for girls, titled Unicorn Squad, and the other for all kids, titled Tech Squad. In collaboration with a mobile workshop startup Merkuur, we expanded our tech capabilities and arranged a few workshops for metalwork and woodwork, the kinds of activities that our current facility otherwise cannot support due to limitations. Together with Merkuur’s wonderful team, the children could make wooden wall clocks, flashlights, metal flash drives, Christmas decorations with LED lights, and a lot more.
Building from the kids feedback last spring, we decided to introduce drone building competences to our team, and now we are able to support kids in that.
Community contribution
One of the core values VIVITA promotes is the inclusion of the wider community to the creative education of the children. Therefore we always encourage the parents of VIVITA members to share their competencies and know-how with children. Sten Šeripov, a renown composer invited VIVITA members to his studio to experiment with sound creation and co-compose a sound clip. Dirk Hoyer, a professor at Baltic Film and Media School, ran a two-day storytelling workshop together with illustrator Sirly Oder. Irja Aavik shared her passion for needle-felting and one grandmother organized an ice-cream and butter-making workshop for our members. Often the parents and kids conduct workshops together, side-by-side.
Our own events
We have also developed our own event series. Once every second month we hold a two-day design thinking and prototyping workshop called VIVITA Design Sprint. For each design sprint, we pick a Sustainable Development Goal established by the United Nations for children to seek creative solutions. First, we explored the climate change and second, the waste pollution.
In the Construct Wisely workshop series children learn to smartly connect materials to each other without using any glue guns or tape. Last but not least we initiated, a series of children-led workshops called Kids Science Lab where kids can teach each other some fun tricks and explaining the science behind it.
Collaboration Projects
One of our main areas of collaboration are ideation sessions with kids. Various organizations approach us with a certain challenge where they would like to hear children’s opinions of how to make a product or service or event more appealing to children and families with children. Together with Prisma we created new designs for the children’s checkout counter. With Telliskivi Loomelinnak we collected children’s ideas and viewpoints of a fun festival.
As VIVISTOP is part of a global community we encourage collaboration also internationally. In July we hosted a summer school for Japanese and Estonian kids to communicate creatively. Some VIVITA members also organized edible science workshops in VIVISTOP Seoul in South Korea. We also hosted a workshop about our future with robots organized by Mina Inoue’s, a 10 year old girl from Japan.
To reach out to even more families and kids, we organize also public events in collaboration with festivals. During Tallinn Design Festival we held four Oh, What a Paper Mess?! workshops where kids could create enormous paper constructions from castles to windmills. Different tech topics were introduced to children during Startup Week. Children experienced basic programming, drone-flying and data analysis.
During the Christmas period, we received a few requests for interior decoration with upcycled materials. The Government Office of Estonia asked us to help decorate their Christmas tree and create a Christmas card. Contemporary photography center Fotografiska asked us to create Christmas decorations for their cafe. As a material, we reused wallpapers with Kirsty Mitchell’s prints.
Free Flow Moments
Stop motion movies, houses for dolls, cats, elves, paintings, dog-shaped keychains, jewellery, tables, board games, drones, robots — these and many other projects came alive during our free-flow sessions. Free flow is especially valuable for children — they can realize their own ideas and we, the crews, are there just to mentor about technical possibilities. Here are also some examples of long-term kids projects.
Karolin, a 10-year old VIVITA member, is working on her project to create DIY slime making kit for kids. She has been experimenting for the perfect recipe for years and she has also conducted many slime-making workshops both in and out of VIVISTOP studio.
Sass, a 9-year old member, has an idea called Skytanker that brings coffee and pastry to drivers who are stuck in traffic. He has already built his first prototype out of LEGO and now we are making the drone for it.
The first year has been full of learnings for kids but also for all the VIVITA staff. We are learning how to build kids' creative confidence and we believe in the process of making. To have even more projects in the future, we are moving to four times bigger space from January 2020 onwards. Stay tuned for even more cool projects and activities!
July — December 2019 in numbers:
- Total visits: 784
- Unicorn Squad — 10 weeks, 15 participants
- Tech Squad — 10 weeks, 12 participants
- VIVITA Design Sprint — 20 participants
- Tallinn Design Festival — 40 participants
- Startup Week — 40 participants
We are especially thankful for your cooperation and support ❤
Fotografiska Tallinn, Telliskivi Creative City, design agency Velvet, Prisma Peremarketid AS, HK Unicorn Squad, Tallinn Startup Week, Merkuur, Tallinn Design Festival, Stenbock House, Startup Week, and many others — and naturally we are grateful for all the families, community and volunteers!
