Projects

This project was designed and built in the Fall of 2021 by the second cohort of community makers in the Reimagining Cities Program at the Idea Center Miami Dade College Wolfson Campus. Each student was supported by a year-long residency at Moonlighter FabLab sponsored by The Jorge M. Perez Family Foundation creARTE grant, The Miami Foundation, and LYFT. The makers were introduced to Tactical Urbanism and Digital Fabrication to shape better public spaces for people.

The designers set out to create a space that promotes wellness, health and safety, and community in a post-covid era. The project includes a plaza for safely gathering and hosting wellness programs, surrounded by an undulating ribbon-like structure of wood that serves as seating, lounging, shade structures, and planters with Florida native species. Adjacent to the plaza, the cohort also created a novel design for e-scooter parking, promoting last-mile micromobility options in the dense urban setting and connecting this new amenity on the urban campus with the greater Downtown Miami community.

Gather Playground was a special commission by Swire Properties to transform an open plaza in Brickell City Centre into a play space for kids and the young at heart! The design creates different activity zones using various sizes of modular hexagonal geometry to define the type of play. Horizontally extruded hexagons allowed children to crawl through, and climb the sides. Vertically extruded hexagon clusters provided a place to hop, balance and sit. All of these elements are nested around a woven vinyl canopy designed and fabricated by AMLgMATD. After all of the play, staring up at the sun rays filtering through a kaleidoscope of colors warms the heart and kindles joy.

This placemaking project carved out a space for the community in a dense urban development – a bright jewel that encourages people to gather. Connecting the residents of the building, workers on break from their offices, visitors of the shops, and the greater Brickell neighborhood in a place completed dedicated to play and relaxation.

The project, a winner of a Public Space Challenge grant from the Miami Foundation, uses specially-designed outdoor projectors created by Mario ‘The Maker’ Cruz and Moonlighter FabLab. Besides displaying original short poems written by local Opa-Locka students and residents, the lamps also add additional illumination to the streetscape with the goal of increasing pedestrian safety.

The poems were gathered by O, Miami through workshops in Opa-locka community centers and schools. They can be found projected onto the walls and sidewalks of several buildings including the Hurt Building, the City of Opa-locka municipal building, La Granja Grocery Store, and others. Each one addresses topics of light, democracy, public safety, transportation, and infrastructure.

Upon the surge of the Covid-19 pandemic, Moonlighter FabLab served as the South Florida Hub for the Open Source Medical Supplies collective – coordinating volunteers as well as fabricating and distributing PPE for medical facilities and organizations serving populations with vulnerable health conditions. Locally, our community created and delivered over 18,000 pieces of free PPE, valued at over $350,000, but the international maker community connected through the OSMS network manufactured and delivered over 48 million pieces of PPE and medical supplies valued at over $271 million dollars.

This was a landmark example of the power of distributed manufacturing collectives and the capabilities of digital fabrication to solve large scale global challenges. School maker labs, Makerspaces, fablabs, and small manufacturing businesses rose to meet the need when the global supply chain was disrupted. Design files were open-sourced and shared freely, a few key components were approved by the NIH, and communities created their own material sourcing, manufacturing, assembly, and distribution supply chain to serve their local regions. The entire experience was inspiring – when the world was experiencing a collective distress, people were empowered to make and deliver practical solutions, using their time and skills to make a difference.

Living Benches are mobile built elements that bring shade, vegetation, and seating to different parts of the city. Made using durable, highly recyclable materials – these units are sustainable throughout their life cycle. Using solar cells to power its drip irrigation system and LED lighting with smart sensors that track when to activate these electronic systems. They are currently growing Coral Honeysuckle, a Florida native vine that thrives in our climate and attracts hummingbirds! The benches debuted during Super Bowl Weekend in Downtown Miami as a pilot – reach out to your local representatives if you want to see more of these greening elements in the city!

Abrazo transforms an underutilized plaza into a place for MDC students and downtowners to convene. This public space pop-up is the culmination of the collective efforts from students in Re-Imagining Cities, an intensive 8-week program by Moonlighter in partnership with the Idea Center at Miami Dade College. The students researched, designed, prototyped, and built their ideas in full scale! Using digital fabrication technologies and low-cost materials, the intervention has created a destination between the MetroMover station entrance, Downtown Miami, and the Miami Dade College campus.

The parklet was designed to extend the restaurant seating for Freshealthy, a tenant of Avenue 3. Its planters provide protection to the people sitting in the parklet and help bring some vegetation to the dense urban street.

Avenue 3 Miami is both a community-driven movement and future pedestrian-oriented street. Avenue 3 aims to catalyze grassroots transformation in Miami’s urban core. Organized by a group of passionate Downtown residents and businesses who want to affect positive change through three central initiatives: streetscape transformation, homeless outreach, and crime prevention to create a safe and vibrant signature street for Downtown Miami.

Winner of the 2018 DDA Baywalk Activation Grant, The project provided Downtown Miami residents a free, fun family activity – while gathering community input for the future plans of the proposed Baywalk project. Citizens were encouraged to prototype the things they’d like to see built on the Baywalk using the oversized lego-like blocks, and they were able to vote on the amenities proposed. The activation hosted various community partners: FDOT, Perez Art Museum Miami, and Frost Science Museum.

The city of North Miami Beach turned what was once a 9-space parking lot into a pedestrian-only plaza. Moonlighter helped The Streetplans Collaborative by fabricating the oversized stencils to create the pattern for the asphalt painting.

“Shell Poems” was a project to put poems inside of sea shells on Miami Beach. 3-D printed shells with Bluetooth speakers hidden inside them were placed on Miami Beach for people to discover. When they put the shell up to their ear, one of several Ocean Vuong poems played, read by the poet himself.

Neushop commissioned Moonlighter to fabricate their custom designed display cases for their new location in the Miami Design District. The centerpiece is a series of waxed MDF boxes at varying heights that can create an undulating form in the space, to display shirts with different colors and hues. The storage, cashier, shoe racks, and shelving were all made using high grade plywood. The result is a minimalistic space that highlights the simplicity and colors of the objects in the shop.

Late at Frost Science was a monthly activation that allowed museum patrons to visit the museum after hours and enjoy special hands on exhibits.

3D Printed Zoetropes

We printed several sculptural zoetropes designed by John Edmark and created the spinning mechanism and strobe light timing system that would allow visitors to animate the sculptures when they found the right combination of rotations to light flashes.

Visualizing Sound

We created two chladni plate designs, one visualizing sound waves via sand and another via water. Visitors were able to switch the frequencies that passed through the mediums to reveal the cymatic patterns.

Touching Sound

Using Makey-Makey boards, visitors were able to use their bodies to “complete the circuits” and activate various audio visual elements projected across the museum.

Bending Light and Form

3D printed stereographic projections allowed visitors to reveal the flat patterns of complex three dimensional sculptures when illuminated from above.

Late at Frost Science – Big Bang: A Sonic Odyssey

Moonlighter was commissioned to design and fabricate various interactive elements for the annual Frost Science fundraising gala.

The Sonic Electronic was an installation with various interactive elements that encouraged visitors to manipulate light and sound through touch.

RGB Shadows was a lighting installation that cast Red Green and Blue shadows of passersby on the walls in the suspended bridge above the Frost Science Entrance.

Light Exposure Postcards used light sensitive paper, designs printed on transparencies, and an LED array to expose the designs onto a postcard that visitors could take with them as a memento of the event.

Light Up Acrylic Bookmarks invited visitors to solder their own LED onto an acrylic bookmark, illuminating the designs etched on the surface.

Laser Maze challenged participants to use various shaped mirrors to reflect a laser beam into the center of a labyrinth.

Prism Wall was an installation that visualized the refraction and reflection of visible light.

Interactive Light Projections allowed visitors to trigger various visual elements that would project on the wall of the 5-story aquarium.

3D Printed Stereographic Projection Votives were used on the cocktail tables and cast a complex shadow pattern.

Custom Illuminated Laser Etched Acrylic Centerpieces were created for the gala dinner tables with illustrations by Creative Cutout featuring various elements on view at the museum.

Giant Lite Brite was a fun interactive that revisited the classic creative game and was a perfect backdrop for celebrity selfies.

Infinity Mirror Photobooth used 8 foot tall mirrors and LED lights to create an illusion of a portal descending infinitely. Guests were able to pose in front of the mirror and use a Photo Booth system to capture their memory at the Frost Science Gala.

“Poetry Robots” are original machines designed by Mario Cruz to disseminate poems through technology.

The Poem-o-matic prints poems on receipt paper. Using a curated database of short poems, the Poem-o-matic prints one poem at a time, at random, with the touch of a button. Each poem tears away (just like a receipt) and can be taken home.

Optimus Rhyme is a robot who reads poems out loud on command. Once initiated, Optimus will read all of the poems in his hard drive in random order, over and over, until someone shuts him off. (Just like a real poet.)

Moonlighter was commissioned to build signage, wooden teepees, and oversized wooden dog houses for a community activation at Margaret Pace Park – mixing brunch and puppies for a delightfully happy morning event!

Plaza 98 is one of 18 projects awarded a Miami Dade County Quick Build grant. The project created a street mural to transform a street and parking spots into a community plaza in Miami Shores Village. Moonlighter created the stencil system to facilitate the painting of the large geometric pineapple design on the asphalt.

This pop-up library and reading lounge was designed and built by a 9-year old maker, Allen Hasbun. He won the design challenge for Moonlighter’s Design Thinking Camp – where the children had a real client to design for: The Miami International Book Fair. The brief was simple, design a mobile library that can create a safe space to distribute and read free books provided by the Book Fair in communities across Miami-Dade County. After prototyping his design and winning the contest, Allen was commissioned to build his solution in full scale and finally debuting it at the Wynwood Yard!

Suncatcher is a free standing open air structure designed to house featured South Florida makers and their works under one roofline while providing shade and relaxation for visitors from the harshness of the daily sun, creating a stained glass effect when activated by the sun while amplifying the tropical flavors of the pavilion’s location.

Moonlighter Makerspace designed laser cut kits that replicate famous radio art deco radio designs on display during the special exhibition at the museum. Museum-goers were able to assemble their own miniature radio kit which would accommodate their cellphones so they could stream the music through their choice of radio design. A fun merging of historical and contemporary design and technology.

Street Plans implemented a day-long public space experiment and intervention along the waterfront in Downtown West Palm Beach. The project was funded by the Van Alen Institute and was conducted in collaboration with the West Palm Beach Community Redevelopment Agency‘s Shore to Core Initiative. The experiment was led by Happy City‘s Charles Montgomery, and in collaboration with University of Virginia Center for Design and Health‘s Dr. Jennifer Roe, PhD, Space Syntax and supported by an intervention led by Street Plans.

The project team transformed a sparse and underutilized public space along the waterfront promenade for one day. Using theories from environmental psychology, the design was meant to create feelings of fascination and a sense of exoticism from everyday life. Art, plants, and historical images focused people’s attention on the water and its history. The team then measured the effects those interventions created on visitors’ emotions, bodies, and behavior.

“The intervention actually caused a change in people’s behavior. This restorative environment induced people to spend more time at the site. The number of people observed in stationary activities at the site increased more than fivefold during the intervention. This is exactly what we need to see if we want to bring life to underperforming public space” says Street Plans’ own Sherryl Muriente.

Streetplans collaborated with Moonlighter to fabricate the built elements to transform the space.

Designed as an ‘urban intervention,’ the Biscayne Green demonstration project repurposed a segment of Downtown’s signature thoroughfare, transformed surface parking lots into public open space, engaged the Downtown community and invited them to experience the Boulevard in a different way, bringing activity to city streets at a time when pedestrian-friendly solutions are so desperately needed.​

Spanning 20 days and featuring various events weekly, Biscayne Green had something for everyone – and over 20,000 people visited the activated space!  But while it was designed to entertain, it also helped reveal what can be achieved when people get out of their cars and onto the street!

Taking over a parallel parking space in front of Downtown restaurant, Soya e Pomodoro, creating an outdoor seating element and extending the restaurant into the street! This is one of about a dozen projects built across Miami in celebration of Park(ing) Day.

The Poetry Roller is an original invention that writes shorts poems into wet sand. The first iteration of the roller was created for O, Miami Poetry Festival 2016 by Juan Gelez and Delia Rivera of Joint Studio and used on South Beach during April 2016. The excerpt is from Miami-born poet Donald Justice’s poem, “Self-Portrait as Still Life” and reads, “Mañana? Always Mañana.” (You can find the poem in his Collected Poems, published by Knopf, and for more on Donald Justice, visit donaldjustice.org.)

The Miami Maker’s Pavilion gathered multidisciplinary artists and designers to create an interactive space for Maker Faire guests to play with and explore. Made from PVC pipes, the pavilion transforms a mundane construction material into an aesthetically complex structural system. Visitors could lounge on AMLgMATD’s Lumqins, made of recycled materials, they could wave their hands over some of the pipes, where sensors would trigger various sounds using devices created by Tinker Tank, and the show-stopping element was a video projection mapped to the exterior of the structure accompanied by interpretive dance curated by Alessandra Fernandez. The structure was a collaborative build by Home Eleven and Moonlighter.