Heather Loughridge sent us this report:
The Eco Group at St Molua’s Church of Ireland, Stormont, Belfast were pleased to host our first Repair Café on the last Saturday morning in June.
Early in 2023, as we looked for new ways to spread the message of “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, we were introduced to the concept of Repair Cafe, and feel privileged to have partnered with members of the Belfast branch to facilitate their first visit to St Molua’s.
Repair Cafe is a global movement with its origins in Amsterdam, and driven by local volunteers who are passionate about helping us all to be more sustainable in our everyday living. Through offering their skills to make repairs to all kinds of items, they are prolonging and rejuvenating the life of our “stuff”, and in the process perhaps giving us the confidence to tackle it ourselves in the future.
Our morning was a great success, and saw many and varied repairs to lamps, bikes, curtains, coffee makers, trouser hems, replacement zips etc… the list goes on. Many visitors came from well beyond the local area, and it was hugely satisfying to witness the delight of those who had been lucky enough to have a well loved item restored and made serviceable again.
Bookings for “repair slots” were made through Belfast Repair Cafe’s own online system. There was also provision for a limited number of “walk-ins” on the day and volunteers admitted to always enjoying the surprises they got in the mix of items brought through the doors!
A vital feature of the Repair Cafe concept is that the owner of the item sits with the volunteer while the Repair is carried out in the hope that they might gain knowledge and skills for the future. Inevitably, some items will not be repairable, or the job might just be too lengthy in the time available. In such cases appropriate advice is always given.
And let’s not forget the other important feature of all such events… the pop up “Pay as you Feel” Cafe, especially appreciated by those waiting for their appointed slot. Thanks are due to the parish volunteers who provided the tea, coffee and sweet treats for the cafe, and then made sure that the repairers were given a welcome soup lunch after their hard work.
All in all a really worthwhile event which we plan to repeat … hopefully Spring 24.