Has your local Occupation been evicted from its major public space?
Do you still want to show your fellow citizens that you're still there?
Build a tiny tent, and occupy every small space instead!
Because you can't evict an idea whose time has come.
Pictures and instructions below.
You, too, can make tiny fabric tents like those shown below:
You will need:
- scissors
- glue: something to glue plastic to itself and something to glue plastic to fabric. This might be the same glue!
- credit cards you don't care about (or lightweight cardboard, like cereal boxes)
- fabric
- cereal boxes or similar
The credit cards (or light cardboard) will be the frame of your tent. The fabric will cover it. The cereal box cardboard is for making a sign to adorn your tent.
Here's how it goes:
Cut the credit card (or cardboard) into thin strips. You want some strips longer than others, to make rectangular frames.
Glue the frames together.
Glue the frames down to your fabric. Leave some space between the frames so the tent will fold nicely.
Trim the fabric away. The fabric along the long sides of the frames should be trimmed close to the frames. Leave an inch to an inch and a half at the ends.
On one end, cut the fabric down the middle, but stop cutting when you reach the frames. Fold the ends over themselves and glue them down. This will end up as the open end of the tent.
Now fold the tent in half, and fold, tuck, and glue the folded-over ends in. (You can also overlap them instead of tucking them inside the tent.) WARNING: If you use superglue in this step, you risk superglueing your fingers to the tent!! While I don't have any problems with people physically securing themselves to tents to slow down an eviction, in this situation, you are most likely to end up the laughingstock of your work party. . . . Which is another way to slow things down, it is true. Carry on.
The completed front.
Now fold and tuck and glue the other end. You can cut this part down the middle before folding if you like, but it didn't seem to make a difference to me in how easy it was to put together.
Here's what the inside looks like, with the extra fabric folded inside.
Trim the extra fabric from the ends, so the tent will sit nicely on the ground.
Cut a small piece of cardboard out and write out a sign! Short phrases work best, like:
You can't evict an idea
Occupy Everywhere
Peace
One Layoff Away
99%
This is a photo of the instruction sheet.
The tents look wonderful if illuminated from inside; tiny LED lights work well for this!
I've also seen people use a needle and thread to add a loop to the top of a tent, to decorate a tree with.
Here is a photo of a sheet for cutting out paper tents. You can use paint, markers, or whatever your crafty heart desires to decorate these before or after cutting and gluing. The Tiny Tent Task Force is just about finished putting a PDF of this online, for easy and accurate printing. PRINT ONTO CARDSTOCK! Regular weight paper looks flimsy and sad.
Share your photos of tiny tents occupying places here, or browse for ideas.
Happy tent-making, everyone!
ETA: The website for the creator of the fabric tent design.
