Helping makers feel like they belong.
MakeLab
The Problem
The Problem
The HCDE MakeLab in Sieg Hall has tools, tables, and department funding, but most students never walk in. Over 80% of survey respondents had never used it. Those who did often treated it as class storage, not a place to make, learn, or connect.
For our capstone, sponsored by HCDE, we asked: How might we redesign the Sieg MakeLab to better support HCDE students by representing their values and needs?
North star: The MakeLab will provide an opportunity for HCDE students to rediscover Sieg Building as the home of HCDE, where various resources, events, and community spaces exist that promote a sense of belonging and inclusive representation within engineering education.
The Research
The Research
Two site visits, a 31-response survey, eleven interviews, and affinity mapping with students and faculty across HCDE.
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Most students don't know it exists
Awareness was the first barrier, not willingness. People couldn't use a space they didn't know was for them.
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It reads as storage, not a studio
The room felt like a place to drop class projects — not to explore tools, build personal work, or stay awhile.
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Events don't always create connection
Students wanted community, but department events often felt cliquey — people talking to friends they already had.
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Staff shape whether people stay
Attentive, skilled, welcoming staff at flexible hours made the difference between trying once and coming back.
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Belonging is visible
Students wanted to see themselves in the space — past projects on walls, student-made features, signs that this room is theirs.
Sometimes with those types of events, a lot of people are either awkward or just talking with their friends.
HCDE student interview
Affinity map — research synthesis on FigJam
Four Interventions
Four Interventions
We didn't redesign the room itself — funding and building constraints wouldn't allow it. Instead, we prototyped four interventions HCDE could act on: make the MakeLab discoverable, celebrate student work, hire equitably, and make the space feel like home.
Advertising campaign
Guidelines for reaching students where they already are — Slack, Instagram, physical flyers, and a clearer web presence — explaining what the MakeLab is, when it's open, and what you can do there.
Trophy case displays
A plan to use the empty trophy cases in Sieg's first-floor hall for rotating student project displays — making engineering work visible to everyone passing by, not just people already inside the lab.
Equitable hiring & training guide
Hiring criteria that prioritize passion for teaching, a learning mindset, and justice-driven thinking over prior makerspace experience — so staff reflect and welcome the students who use the space.
Hiring guide document or process diagram
Aesthetic improvements
Tool organization by category with consistent signage, student art on the walls, and clearer pathways — small physical changes aimed at comfort, accessibility, and "homeness."
Layout mockups, signage concepts, or student art installations
How We Got Here
How We Got Here
Research pointed to systemic gaps — not a single broken feature. We ran a co-design session with five HCDE students, mapped the MakeLab ecosystem, and used five whys to connect behaviors to values like equity, belonging, and agency.
Research & synthesis
Understand the space and the people
Site visits to the HCDE MakeLab and UW Bothell's makerspace. Surveys and interviews with students and faculty. Affinity mapping to find patterns — especially around awareness, staff, and belonging.
Co-design
Design with students, not just for them
Five BS students explored the MakeLab, sketched mock layouts, and mapped where they expect to find resources across Sieg — grounding our proposals in how people actually move through the building.
Co-design session — layout sketches and participant work
Mission statements
Turn findings into four actionable missions
Instead of one sprawling redesign, we aligned each deliverable to a mission: empower learning outside the classroom, celebrate diverse identities, represent students equitably, and cultivate homeness. A service blueprint mapped the ideal student journey through the MakeLab over time.
Service design blueprint or ecosystem map
Two ideas — live status tracking for tool availability and a full materials reorganization — were scoped out due to time. They remain in our final report as recommendations for HCDE.
Reflection
Reflection
What I learned
- Space design is service design. The MakeLab's problem wasn't missing tools — it was missing discovery, representation, and reasons to stay.
- Our team shared a similar background as many BS students, which built trust in interviews — but it also meant we had to actively seek perspectives we didn't represent (graduate students, international students, non-makers).
- Capstone work doesn't always ship as product. Our deliverables are guidelines and prototypes meant to persuade HCDE to invest — the real test is whether they get implemented.
What I'd do next
- Research with MS and PhD students — scheduling kept them out of co-design, and their relationship to the MakeLab may differ.
- Test interventions after implementation — especially the advertising campaign and trophy case, once HCDE puts them in place.
- Revisit status tracking — students wanted to know when the lab is open, staffed, and not overcrowded before making the trip to Sieg's first floor.
MakeLab reminded me that inclusive design starts with who feels allowed to enter a room — and that the most impactful work isn't always a new interface. Sometimes it's a trophy case, a hiring guide, and a flyer that tells you the door is open.
HCDE Capstone 2026 · Team: Rhiannon Hayes-McQueen, Jordyn Padzensky, Darby Moore · Sponsor: Tyler Fox