Prototype PGH was founded by E.Louise Larson and Erin Gatz in September 2016. With support from the Sprout Fund, we engaged over 500 participants in our free workshops and events during our first year. We also partnered with the Mayor’s Office on Inclusive Innovation Week, hosted a residency for students from the Ontario College of Art and Design, participated in the AS220 artist residency in Rhode Island, presented at the annual Google design conference, and participated in the Full Circle nonprofit accelerator through Social Venture Partners.

In 2018 we received a grant from Google to engage 1,000 participants in free workshops, incubate 5 emerging organizations, and hire a part-time staff person. We also received a grant from the BNY Mellon Foundation to engage and compensate 100 women of color as educators and participants in technology and entrepreneurial workshops. During our first two years of operations, we were fiscally sponsored by New Sun Rising and we benefitted immensely from their Grow Residency program.

In April 2019 we became an official 501(c)(3) non profit organization and offered city-wide workshops in partnership with the University of Pittsburgh Manufacturing Assistance Center (Pitt MAC) in Homewood. We also received a grant from Opportunity Fund to support the growth of our incubator. In the summer of 2019, we presented our work at the Nation of Makers Conference in Chattanooga, Tennessee as well as the Annual Hackers & Designers Summer Academy in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

In 2024 we started our workforce development program, Step On Up: Maker to Manufacturer. In 2026 we are on our third cohort of this program, offering an opportunity to people of marginalized gender and racial experiences to attend workshops at Prototype and partnering organizations for manufacturing skillsets such as CNC and welding. The Maker to Manufacturer program is an initial stepping stone to a career in manufacturing for people often excluded from those opportunities.

In 2025, Prototype hired our first executive director who is not a co-founder of the organization, Gene Anderson. Gene is a queer feminist with combined experience in corporate consulting, non-profit bookkeeping, and as a workshop instructor teaching sewing skills at Prototype, and today they manage operations and strategic partnerships for Prototype while still hosting Trans Tailoring meetups and teaching the occasional workshop.

Today, we continue to host a variety of workshops in both of our locations (606 Main Street in Sharpsburg and 460 Melwood Ave in Oakland), provide a space for creativity and entrepreneurship for women and queer folks of Pittsburgh, and foster partnerships across Southwestern PA. We wouldn’t be able to do what we do without the outstanding guidance we receive from Marlene van Nelson at Trellis Legal and Simone Quinerly at Quinerly Financial Group.