Repair café in the works

By Lachlan Ellis

We’re often quick to replace broken items these days, but a new community service aims to provide an alternative, connecting residents with volunteer repairers.

The Darley Neighbourhood House & Learning Centre is launching the ‘Marsh Mender’ repair café on 26 February, and is asking for local businesses, tradespeople, or anyone with mending skills, to lend a hand.

The concept aims not just to save people money, but also reduce waste from items unnecessarily being thrown away, and raise awareness on just how many items can be repaired when broken.

Amber Kennedy is the Neighbourhood House’s Project Coordinator for the Marsh Mender, and said the program would also be a chance for participants to socialise and learn new skills.

“We’re doing kind of the Darley take on a repair café, starting off nice and small with our opening day on the 26th of February, with the events happening once a month. You bring in something that is perhaps broken or needs mending, and hopefully we’ll have someone there that will be able to check it out,” Ms Kennedy told the Moorabool News.

“The idea is more than just getting things fixed, it’s also getting people to start thinking about getting things fixed, rather than the first thought being to throw a broken item out and get a new one. And it’s not just that you bring in your shirt missing a button, and leave with a shirt with a new button, it’s that you actually sit down with the person mending it and they show you how to mend the button.”

The extent of what the Marsh Mender can fix will largely depend on who volunteers and what the take-up is from the community, and Ms Kennedy and the team at the Neighbourhood House are excited to see how the program develops.

“What can be fixed goes back to who the menders are, and we’ve put the call out to see what skills we have in the area. We’re keeping the commitment from a mender’s perspective as low as we can – the minimum commitment that they ever have to give would be a couple of hours, ever…but there might be people who enjoy it and come back every month,” Ms Kennedy said.

“It’s really exciting to think about how many paths it can take and what it can develop into, but it’ll depend on the community and what the community sees the future of it being.”

For updates on the Marsh Mender program, follow the Darley Neighbourhood House & Learning Centre Facebook page.

The project is funded by a Sustainability Victoria grant provided to the Neighbourhood House.