Varvara (born in Tartu, Estonia), gained her bachelor degree in IT from Estonian IT College, master degree in digital media from ISNM in Germany and currently is a PhD candidate at the Estonian Art Academy in the department of Art and Design.

Mar (born in Barcelona) has two degrees: in art and design from ESDI in Barcelona and in computer game development from University Central Lancashire in UK. Also he is a co-founder of Derivart and Lummo.

Varvara Guljajeva & Mar Canet will be Future Artist-Maker artists in residence at FabLab Limerick in in late Feb and early March 2017. The residency will develop their project Flat Knitic - open source knitting machine, in which they will design and fabricate software and hardware to create a jacquard knitting machine able to make 2 colors patterns. Taking advantage of digital fabrication tools and idea of replicable machines, their idea is to make a completely open source knitting machine from scratch using digital fabrication tools, like 3D printing and laser cutting. They have been working with knitting machines since the beginning of 2012. Their interest towards an electronic knitting machine Brother (originated from 1976) started with an art project called SPAMpoetry (http://www.varvarag.info/spamp... ). Textile fabrication has a huge potential in the age of digital fabrication and customisation. Moreover, knitting is a skill that humanity has been using for ages. Hence, there are lots of experts, knowledge, learning and production material, tools, etc. On the contrary, the ability to 3D print or laser-cut is the competence of very few people. It means introducing craft in general to the desktop manufacturing
communities and Fab Labs, bringing a new participation and potentially  a better  gender balance to these networks.