The Repair Café is popping-up at the Guille-Allès Library on Saturday January 16th. The Repair Café, which has been running twice a week since August 2020 from the Health Connections Store on Smith Street, will expand with an afternoon of mending in the Library’s Dorey Room, from 1-4pm.
The Repair Café is free to attend and provides a friendly and sociable environment where people can meet with volunteer Repairers to fix and refurbish broken items. On the 16th, there will be volunteers on hand to help with clothing and textiles (e.g. soft toys and furnishings) as well as small household goods and electrical items.
Camilla Smillie, Sustainable Projects Lead at the Clean Earth Trust Comments, “We’re really pleased to be able to run our first Repair Café at such a great location. There are so many benefits to repairing, not only are we helping people to reuse their items and reduce waste, but it’s a great way to meet new people, have a chat over a cup of tea and learn a new skill. We want to make repairing accessible to everyone and share our belief that repairing items should be an integral part of our society, and our first thought when something breaks instead of purchasing new.”
With expert guidance, participants are invited to get involved in the repair process as much as possible, so they can leave with hands-on experience for the future. Those interested in attending can register on Eventbrite at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/135534552495 or email repaircafe@cleanearthtrust.org.
Catherine Stuart, Head of Learning and Development at the Library comments, “We’re really looking forward to hosting the Repair Café at the Library. It’s a great opportunity for people to learn more about mending and upcycling, and to breathe new life into some old items that need a bit of TLC. We hope people will stop by on Saturday to see what the Repair Café is all about.”
The Clean Earth Trust team will also be onsite to assist and welcome any donations of good quality fabrics, buttons, zips and other sewing materials which can be used for future upcycling projects. Home-made cakes will be on sale and participants are encouraged to bring their re-useable mugs in order to grab a hot drink from the Library foyer.