About us
LakeLab is an open workshop in Bäch. We share machines that would otherwise sit idle most of the time, and the knowledge of how to work them.
How it started
It started in 2020, when we began buying machines ourselves. Ordering prototypes elsewhere kept getting more expensive, and we like to improve things ourselves. Over the years one machine followed another, first the printers, then the laser, then the mill. At some point there was more in the room than two people can use at once.
The only one in the canton
Switzerland has around thirty open workshops, hackerspaces and FabLabs spread across eleven cantons. Canton Schwyz had none. Anyone from Wollerau, Freienbach, Lachen or Einsiedeln who wanted to build something drove to Rapperswil, Zug or Zurich.
What we are after
Meeting people
The important part is not the machine, it is whoever stands next to it. Sitting over things together, showing what you are working on, throwing ideas back and forth.
Learning from each other
Projects, exchange, input. If you know something, pass it on. If you do not, ask. Both are worth the same here.
Doing it yourself
The machines are here so you use them and learn something along the way. For your own projects, not for commissioned work.
What is still to come
A few things are on the list but not yet in the calendar. Games evenings for one, some friends restored retro consoles and those are already standing here. Courses, once enough people want to learn something. And a printing and commission service for anyone who needs something made without coming by in person.
Not an association yet
LakeLab is not an association, just a group of people sharing the space. If enough of us come together, we will found one. SaniGear GmbH provides the room and the machines.
When it turns commercial
The association is not commercial. SaniGear GmbH, which provides the room, does however offer the machines commercially, to members and to anyone else. They know the problem first hand: the first prototypes are the expensive part. Write to them directly, or mention it at the lab and we will put you in touch.
info@sanigear.chThursday evening or Saturday morning, no booking needed.