Good NewsRepair Cafés connect broken items with fix-it experts
We all have in-need-of-repair household items lying around, waiting indefinitely for some DIY attention, often doomed to the dump.
We need the Repair Café.
In Amsterdam, a network of volunteers is dedicated to both giving those broken-down items a second chance and to teaching basic repair skills to those of us who don't know what to do with a busted toaster.
"I started the café because I think it's a shame we throw things away before their time," Martine Postma, founder of the Repair Café Foundation, told RNW. "Many people don't know how to repair things anymore."
The Repair Café's volunteers are skilled craftsmen, seamstresses and DIY enthusiasts who mend broken items, from furniture and appliances to clothes and toys, while teaching the items' owners how to tackle the repairs themselves.
Postma, who claims we've "simply lost the culture of repairs," opened the first of 20 Repair Cafés in 2009 "to bring together two groups of people: 'repair volunteers' and those who want to fix things but don't know how," reports Nicolas Delaunay of Agence France-Presse.
Another 50 cafés are currently being planned.
Volunteers each run their own café, establishing work hours and location — workspaces are either rented by the individual or provided by the local municipality — sourcing their own tools, and recruiting their own team of volunteers.
If one launched in your neighbourhood, would you take advantage of a Repair Café?
