Can they fix it? Yes they can! First repair cafe in town is a big success
Businesses mend items for free, ranging from a clock and a bike to a stool and clothing
Scarborough has played host to its first ever repair cafe.
The event was held by Coast and Vale Community Action’s Circular Coast project and Leeds University’s Yorkshire Circular Lab at The Street.
The repair cafe is a place where people can take their broken items, whether that be a jumper with a hole in it, a stool with a missing leg or laptop where the space bar has got stuck, and specialists will do their best to fix them.
It allows consumers to reduce waste, save money, share skills and get people to work together to make the most of their resources.
David Stone, of Coast and Vale Community Action, said: “We wanted to do this repair cafe today to try out the idea. We know people in other parts of the country and other parts of the world run repair cafes and we think it’s a great idea.
“It’s a great way for people to make their resources stretch further. If you can fix something, and you’ve got the knowledge and confidence to do that then you’re going to save money.
“It’s got the added benefit of old items not being sent to landfill and all the carbon emissions that would go into a new product you would buy aren’t produced.
“It’s just a great social event as well. It brings people together and they have really good, useful conversations.”
The repair cafe consisted of stalls made up of local businesses who had taken time out of their day to fix items for free. The local businesses included Bikeabout, the Community Furniture Store, Material Moves and Jennings Computer Services.
The stalls included bikes, furniture, electrical appliances, clothing, computers and there was even a knife sharpening stall.
The first item in was a 1800s clock brought by Ray Dobson, a local resident. He has owned the clock since the 1950s, and his grandparents and great grandparents owned it before that.
Bob Bunce, from the Community Furniture Store, took a look at the clock. The clock
itself worked, but the chimes that accompanied it weren’t working. Unfortunately, Bob was unable to mend the chimes this time.
Dave Peacock brought in the next item, a bicycle, originally from Holland which had problems with its brake pads.
Dave said that because of the make of the bike, and with it being from Holland, it can be quite tricky to fix as the bike isn’t common in England.
However, Bob Houghton
from Bikeabout was able to repair the brake pads.
Third in was Lucy Somper, from the jewellery company Lasso Designs.
Lucy uses a Dremel tool to create jewellery from sea glass, and usually takes the tool apart when she’s not using it to prevent it from turning rusty inside.
However, when she last used the Dremel, she didn’t separate it and it had turned rusty.
Another item that came in to be repaired was a stool. One of the legs had come off, and it needed new dowels replaced in order for the fourth leg to be placed back on.
The owner had had the chair for 50 years, and said he was “delighted, the repair cafe has made it useful and not useless”.
There are plans for further repair cafes at The Street, which are yet to be announced.