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12
March
2014
|
13:28
Europe/London

Major new tech festival coming to Hackney

A world-renowned technology and innovation festival is coming to Hackney next summer.

The Maker Faire will be held at Here East, formerly iCITY, and is expected to bring tens of thousands of tech enthusiasts, crafters, educators, engineers, science clubs, authors, artists, students and commercial exhibitors to the site on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.

The initiative, launched in 2006 and described as the ‘Greatest Show (and Tell) on Earth’, usually has just two ‘flagship’ festivals which take place in San Francisco and New York, with a series of smaller events across the globe.

This new third flagship fair will run in the 2015 summer holidays for up to four weeks, and is expected to draw about 75,000 people.

Cllr Guy Nicholson, Cabinet Member for Regeneration, Hackney Council
It’s entirely fitting that Maker Faire is coming to Hackney, a borough which has established itself as London's leading community of creative innovators and makers embracing advanced tech to build an economy based on both design and manufacture. “The expansion of Hackney's economy continues apace with the new Here East in Hackney Wick acting as the Maker Faire host. Across the borough local businesses and the Council are working together to unlock the full potential of this growth for the wider community, creating routes to jobs and space for start up businesses.
Cllr Guy Nicholson, Cabinet Member for Regeneration, Hackney Council

The decision to launch a third flagship Maker Faire was announced during the South by Southwest Interactive festival in Austin, Texas. Hackney House, Hackney Council’s award-winning alternative trade mission, and Here East have been showcasing the talents of East London’s creative, tech and design community during the event this month.

last month to turn the former broadcast and media centres of the Olympic Park into a cluster of tech firms.

With more than one million square feet of space, it aims to bring together global companies alongside east London’s most innovative start-ups. It will offer some of the most advanced digital infrastructure in the world, including almost unlimited bandwidth connectivity and the highest capacity power.

The site is expected to generate 7,500 jobs, a host of training and education opportunities and support east London’s flourishing creative and digital industries.