Looking for yo-yo collections to display in a science center (Belgium)

Yo-Yo Exhibition
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Hi all,

I work at Technopolis, a science center in Belgium with around 300,000 visitors a year, mostly families and school groups.

One of our most popular exhibits is Maxwell’s wheel: a wheel that rolls down its axle, swaps potential energy for rotation, and climbs back up again. It’s a yo-yo in everything but name, and visitors love it.

We’d like to build on that. The idea is to hang a wall of roughly 100 different yo-yos next to the exhibit, so visitors can see how many shapes, materials and designs come out of the same bit of physics. I’m also approaching a few manufacturers, but I’d much rather hear from the people who actually play and collect.

So my question: would anyone be willing to lend part of their collection for a longer period (think 2 year or more)? It doesn’t need to be rare or expensive. Variety is what matters: old and new, wood, plastic, metal, responsive and unresponsive, odd shapes, anything with a story.

What we can offer:

  • A prominent spot in front of a large, interested audience
  • Credit for the collector, with a name or a short story on the display if you like
  • Careful mounting and handling by our own team

I’m happy to talk through practicalities such as security, insurance, shipping and how long it would run. If you’re in or near Europe, that makes things easier, but I’m open to ideas.

If you’re interested, or know someone who might be, reply here or send me a message. And if you’ve got thoughts on what would make a yo-yo wall worth looking at, I’d be glad to hear them.

Thanks!
Pieter

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Hi Pieter.

I’m in the Netherlands and one of the organiseren of the a Benelux Yoyo Championships and a member of Yoyo vereniging Nederland.

Send me an email at lxemergency@gmail.com and we can talk and probably help you out.

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Alexander, that is so awesome!

I’m certain… Actually I’m positive… That that museum guy wouldn’t have been a penny that they would be somebody within driving distance of where he’s at.

You are two hours and 40 minutes from Belgium. And you are no doubt a yo-yo man.

And you are also no doubt the absolute perfect match for what that guy is looking for.

Even more amazing, in a sense it creates a potential venue for you and your local yo-yo crew.

Once you’ve helped the guy help with the display, when it is introduced to the public, you could be there on that day and give yo-yo demonstrations to the school kids or whoever else I’d be going through the museum.

That way would be the simplest way for anybody and everybody visiting that exhibit, to get a more of three-dimensional understanding in actually watching the yo-yo in motion when a person has it tied to their finger as opposed to a machine showing physics in action.

Obviously, he’s already stated that the exhibit is a big hit with the functional model of the physics of a yo-yo.

But actually watching you, blaze away a little and maybe even teach the crowd a couple of tricks, lol. That may go a long way into spreading the word and even more people would be interested in coming to the museum just to check out that particular exhibit.

I understand that the guy suggests about 100 yo-yos of different sizes and shapes and not necessarily expensive… Just a variety of various peoples design views on what yo-yo should look like.

And they could make an obvious mental comparison between the functional display versus all the yo-yos on the wall.

But I think it would certainly be more interesting to see the Complexity of what can be done with a yo-yo, especially with some of them more dynamic tricks that you are obviously capable of doing. Or maybe even a few of your yo-yo friends that might really be yo-yo monsters, they could take the road trip with you and really give them a show.

I know I’m obviously thousands of thousands of miles away from you. So you might wonder why am I excited about this? Good question.

I’m excited about it because that guy is trying to implement something into the exhibit to give it more awesomeness.

And you are less than three hours away from providing that awesomeness.

You have excellent communication skills. You make excellent first impressions. You are an experienced yo-yo player. You are experienced in dealing with other yo-yo players. And you can basically show them better than you can tell them.

It just seems like a perfect match to me. Sometimes the stars just align. That guy Pieter hadn’t the slightest clue the solution to his challenge was basically right down the road, lol.

Actually, you are obviously the chosen one. You are not the chosen one because I chose you. You are the chosen one because you responded to the guy and said you could help him out, lol.

Good luck

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Yeah I don’t know if I can supply him with 100…that’s basically 95% of all the yoyos I own.

But I’m sure we can do something for him.

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sounds like a good time to reach out to some brands to get some display yoyos :stuck_out_tongue: i’m sure a few would love the marketing

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Yeah @pieter.loots stated that he’s reaching out to some brands already.

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This is so very awesome @pieter.loots @yoyodoc definitely has a great idea about you @LX_Emergency and/or the club putting on exhibitions there also. It’s an amazing opportunity to expose crowds to yo-yo.

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Hi Everybody! thanks for the replies! Quite the energetic community this YoYo com. @LX_Emergency I Send you a mail to connect directly because if I understand correct we are indeed not that far apart and speak the same language? Namelijk Nederlands? Toch?

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