NEW LEBANON – Do you want a new part for a toaster? Sew a tear in a sleeve? Would you like a lamp to glow once again?
Have no concern. A fix shop is coming to Columbia County later on this month.
The Repair Café is a community party exactly where people today can carry their broken goods and have volunteers fix them absolutely free of cost.
“It truly is not just about finding men and women out of the local community to assistance other individuals, it’s also about avoiding things from heading to landfill, and we may perhaps be equipped to resolve a little something we you should not know how to take care of,” said Maintenance Café Press Get hold of and member of the Austerlitz Climate Clever Committee Cara Humphrey.
This summer time, the Weather Sensible Communities New Lebanon, Chatham, Canaan, Austerlitz and East Nassau teamed up to provide a repair service café to the location. The Repair Café will just take put on Oct 23 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the New Lebanon Fireplace Household at 523 Route 20 in New Lebanon.
There have been restore cafes all about the United States, Humphrey explained. They have been in the Hudson Valley due to the fact 2014. Repair cafés in New York are element of the Climate Sensible Neighborhood application. Humphrey reported 1 way for a town to earn details for a Local climate Sensible award is to run two maintenance cafes within just 12 months.
The volunteer fitters for the upcoming fix café are qualified in sewing, darning, carpentry, simple electrical repairs, bicycles, pc application, sneakers, jewelry, ceramics and leather products.
“Due to the fact web hosting a person of these is a major enterprise and being profitable, particularly if you are not a seasoned repair service café occasion organizer, we labored with a team of towns,” claimed Humphrey. “Each of our taking part cities has a Local weather Clever Community, and we are all chaotic performing items like restore cafés or photo voltaic campaigns or recycling systems. Fingers crossed.”
COVID logs are adopted in the fix cafe, Humphrey said. She reported some of the mend tables will be outdoors.
“We have some actually interesting people who are not just about repairs but can give guidance on getting HVAC techniques, guidance on some issues similar to childcare and personalized care.”
The maintenance cafe is predicted to have all over 30 volunteers, Humphrey explained. There are about 15 “fixers”. Most fixers have resources and instruments that use them. The cafe will also have a “runner” who can go to the community hardware shop if they will need added economical materials.
“We will have an stock of the fundamental company,” said Humphrey. “So if you bring your previous damaged lamp with you, you can find probable an electrician on web site who can possibly establish what is actually wrong with it if he or she won’t be able to fix it on website, and if we will need inexpensive materials, we have a male who can operate across the street to the hardware retail store. “
“The thought is that we can have a jewelry restore finished with the individuals who brought their loved just one, damaged what ever, lamp, frame, whichever, perhaps have to have a little jewellery restore,” Humphrey said. “We’re seeking to get a knife sharpener, we all have knives that could be sharpened. And we persuade the fixer to instruct on the side. “
The notion for the Repair Café was introduced to everyday living by Martine Postma. According to the Maintenance Café web site, she has been campaigning for sustainability in lots of means at the regional amount due to the fact 2007.
Postma arranged the initial Fix Café on October 18, 2009 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The results prompted her to set up the Repair service Cafe Basis. Since 2011, the non-income organization has been offering skilled assist to regional teams in the Netherlands and other international locations who want to established up their possess maintenance café. In accordance to the web site, there are far more than 1,500 mend cafes globally.
The to start with repair café in New York point out was held in New Paltz in 2013, Humphrey mentioned. These days there are more than 30 in the Hudson Valley and New York Condition
For far more details or to volunteer in the repair service or to aid the venture: Adelia Moore (adeliamoore@gmail.com) New Lebanon, Wendy Dwyer (missmisc@icloud.com) Canaan, Cara Humphrey (carasoup07@gmail.com) Austerlitz.
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