LEWISTON — Museum L-A and Bates Mill will host Maine’s first Maker Faire, a convention and show for amateur techno-philes, hobbyists and do-it-yourselfers.

Rachel Desgrosseilliers, Museum L-A executive director, said the Twin Cities effort was allowed to begin organizing by the national Maker Faire organization this week. The event is scheduled for Sept. 8 in the Bates Mill atrium.

Desgrosseilliers said she hopes to use the Bates Mill’s history as a center of industry to tie into the national maker and high tech do-it-yourselfer trend.

“Lewiston has history as a home to inventors, so this seemed a good way to connect with that,” she said.

The first Maker Faire started in California in 2005, and the 2011 edition had more than 100,000 attendees and featured presentations by Adam Savage of the Mythbusters and Maine’s Coke and Mentos experimenters Eepybird.

The events are supported by MAKE Magazine and O’Reilly Publishing. The events give hobbyists and craftmakers a chance to show off their creations with interactive displays, games and demonstrations.

Since the inaugural event, organizers have sponsored similar fairs around the world, including Detroit, Boston, New York and London.

They also support smaller minifairs designed for between 300 and 6,000 attendees, and that’s the variety Desgrosseilliers wants.

“We’re having a medium-sized fair, with room for 30 and 50 displays,” she said. “For a first-time event, I think it’s a good place to start.”

People wanting to host a display at the Lewiston-Auburn event should register at the Web site, makerfairelewistonauburn.com, by July 27.

staylor@sunjournal.com

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