By Mandy Oakham
Flickering computers, holed boots, dresses with broken zippers and bike tyres gone flat will be some of the items revived for free at Geelong’s first Repair Cafe this weekend.
St Luke’s Uniting Church, in Highton, will host the event from 1pm and 4pm Saturday after the first repair cafe appeared in Amsterdam eight years.
The foundation behind the initiative, which links skilled volunteers with residents needing free repairs, estimates that more than 400 of the cafes now operate around the world.
Cafe patrons bring broken items to watch, learn or help as the volunteers complete the repairs. Many items are fixed during the event, while more-challenging jobs might be referred to local speciality repairers.
The organisers explained that the volunteers weren’t necessarily tradespeople but they were tinkerers; people who loved to work with objects.
Volunteers could be people who loved bikes and who had learnt to repair and maintain them, the organisers said, while others might be home sewers or just someone who always pulled things apart to learn how they worked.
One of the organisers, Michelle Walker, said the ABC series War on Waste inspired her working group.
“I was talking with a few friends from the church about the War on Waste and how we had seen people going to a repair cafe in Sydney,” she said, “so we were all sitting around and I said we could do something like that and we started asking around and before we knew it was all happening.
“I then approached Geelong for Sustainability and they swung into action and have been a great help in getting everything ready for this weekend.”
Ms Walker said the church already ran a men’s shed which was a ready supply of able volunteers who could help with repairs.
The church also used a room of old sewing machines to teach refugees how to sew, she said.
“We’re looking forward to a great turnout on Saturday and we want people to bring along things like bikes, small kitchen appliances, upholstery but, no, we won’t be able to help with washing machines – er, a little big.”
