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Repair Café idea a form of recycling

First opportunity happens this weekend at Royal Bay
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Attendees at a Repair Café in Saanich work with Billy Metcalf on repairing a small appliance. Emmet McCusker with the City of Colwood is one of the people behind a new West Shore version of the popular workshops. The first such event happens this weekend at Royal Bay secondary.

Arnold Lim

News Gazette staff

Have something in need of a little repair? There’s a café for that.

The West Shore’s first known Repair Café, a free initiative featuring skilled people sharing knowledge, experience, and sometimes tools to help fix miscellaneous household items, has come to Colwood.

The City’s deputy engineer Emmet McCusker, one of the fixers at the event, said the localized effort is fun, environmentally sound and helpful.

“The Repair Café brings the community together in a positive, relaxed and social setting,” he said. “People are very appreciative, it’s quite a lot of fun and new bonds are formed between members of the community.”

The Café is open and free to anyone with a small appliance or miscellaneous household item in need of repair. There is even fabric repair, sewing, knitting and jewelry repair. As well, two luthiers will help simple stringed instrument repairs and guitar set-ups.

The idea is to have these type of events throughout Greater Victoria, starting with Colwood and View Royal. Similar events help reduce the waste placed in landfills around the world.

The first Café happens tomorrow (April 16)  at the Creatively United for the Planet event at Royal Bay secondary from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. On April 23, View Royal will host the next iteration of the Repair Café thanks to a local initiative.

“The idea is to have at least two to three of these events every year in Colwood, and I think it’s likely the same for View Royal,” McCusker said.

Other municipalities could be on their way to hosting these events. McCusker said they continue to look for volunteers to help out with the Colwood events. Anyone looking to get involved can email him at emmet.mccusker@gmail.com.

alim@goldstream gazette.com



Arnold Lim

About the Author: Arnold Lim

I'm an award-winning photojournalist, videographer, producer, and director.
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