Technocopia’s First
Repair Cafe
By: Ariel Amasifuén and Riley Pettit
We ran our first repair cafe! Here’s how everything went!
Introduction
Our community has been fixated on the idea of a regular repair cafe for a good while, but as always, the limit has been capacity. With a new group of board members at Technocopia, we’ve added a bit of capacity! In particular, Ariel Amasifuen decided to take on the organizing needed to actually make it happen.
Why Are We So Fixated On Repair Cafes?
Repairing gives us joy! Giving new life to well loved belongings is a magical experience. There’s this light of excitement in folks’ eyes when they realize that with a bit of work and support, you have the control to bring something back to life.
Repairing helps us Reduce Waste! By keeping something from the landfill you save money and keep it from being added to the 2 billion tonnes of waste generated each year. On top of that, when folks bring in older items they’ll often say “they don’t make them like they used to” and that’s often true! Major corporations are weaponizing planned obsolescence to sell more stuff. There are more and more conversations talking about the right to repair, and how the history of planned obsolescence began.
Repairing builds community! Sharing knowledge, stories, and connections with our neighbors is incredibly valuable. Many folks come to makerspaces for the tools but stick around for the community! That’s also why we ensure there are weekly Free Public Events!
Getting Ready
Because we were signed up for multiple events in June, we decided to time our repair cafe the weekend after The Thicket’s annual Thicknic, a plus-sized focused clothing swap, and the pride market hosted by Cold Moon Arts at Vincent’s. We gave out tons of fliers and nearly 100 mini sewing repair kits!
We also got pretty popular on social media! Our main post had 24K+ views and was shared by folks on local mutual aid groups. The Telegram & Gazette even reached out to include us in an article about a new directory of repair events. Thank you to everyone who got the word out about the event!
Running The Repair Cafe Proper
The day of the event was a huge success! Despite the onslaught of engagement we got online, we were able to keep the 3 hours manageable with around 40 participants.
There was a queue of folks, but with an air conditioned kitchen, snacks, and entertaining repair watching to be had they were okay with waiting their turn. We had a good number of textile projects, two bikes, and a lot of appliances including fans, lamps, a toaster, a coffee maker, and more! We also had a number of folks getting their knives sharpened, and someone also got their sewing machine repaired, and spent the rest of the repair cafe sewing up whatever they wanted.
Our members did an amazing job not only repairing for our guests, but many of them also gabbing with folks, making friends, and giving some information about the repairs so they had context, and could learn about what goes into fixing their belongings.
The Next Repair Cafe
We’ll be continuing with quarterly repair events with the next one scheduled for International Repair Day – October 17th!
We’d love to schedule more regular events and look into running collaborative repair cafes with places like libraries or other community centers outside the makerspace. BUT that will require additional resources and tools. We’ll be looking into some possible grants for those expansions but in the meantime we have some practical improvements to make:
- Expanding marketing through neighborhood organizations
- Expanding our pool of volunteers (especially so we don’t burn out our regulars)
- Buying low cost supplies for common repairs like lamp hardware
- Creating pamphlets and zines about Right to Repair and common repair skills
Want to help with the next event?
The Repair Cafe will always be free but the current costs will limit our capacity. If you’d like to donate to support future events you can do so here!
Have skills to share? Fill out our Repair Volunteer Interest form and we’ll reach out about the next event!
Spread the word! Follow us on Instagram for updates or share our fliers with your community!
Thank you so so much to our new board member Ariel for taking the lead on organizing the event, to our volunteers who helped so many community members repair their belongings, and our community for coming to engage with us and learn about the space! Let’s continue this momentum for the next cafe, and make the experience as welcoming and supportive as possible.