Chelmsford starts its own Repair Café
At the Chelmsford Senior Center on Groton Road in North Chelmsford, on September 23, everything centers on making repairs. Starting from 10am and ending at 1pm, various volunteer repair experts will be available to help make all possible repairs free of charge. Tools and materials will also be on hand. People visiting the Repair Café will bring along their broken items from home. Toasters, lamps, hair dryers, clothes, bikes, toys, crockery... anything that is broken is welcome. And can more than likely be repaired. The Repair Café specialists almost always have the know-how.
By promoting repairs, the Chelmsford Recycling Committee, the Chelmsford Library and the Chelmsford Senior Center want to help reduce mountains of waste. This is absolutely necessary. We throw away piles of stuff in the U.S., even things which practically have nothing wrong with them, and which could easily be used again after a simple repair. Unfortunately, many people have forgotten that they can have things repaired. Repair Café wants to change all that.
Repair Café is also meant to put neighbors in touch with each other in a new way. And to discover that a lot of know-how and practical skills can be found close to home. If you repair a bike, a CD player or a pair of pants together with a previously unfamiliar neighbor, you look at that person in a different light the next time you run into them on the street.
Jointly making repairs can lead to pleasant contacts in the neighborhood. Repairs can save money and resources, and can help minimize CO2 emissions. But above all, Repair Café just wants to show how much fun repairing things can be, and how easy it often is.
Repair Café Foundation
The Repair Café concept arose in the Netherlands, in 2009, and was formulated by Martine Postma, at the time an Amsterdam-bases journalist/publicist. In 2010, she started the Repair Café Foundation (see Repaircafe.org). This foundation provides support to local groups around the world wishing to start their own Repair Café. The foundation also supports the Repair Café in Chelmsford.