If you have wobbly furniture, small appliances that need fixing or torn clothing, you can bring it to the Halifax Repair Cafe to have it fixed for free. “A place where you can go with any household item that’s broken and you don’t want to throw it away, or you’re either attached to it, or you just don’t want it to end up in the landfill. That can be anything from small electronics to little kitchen appliances to clothing to small furniture,” says Tom Servaes, Halifax Repair Association president. On Saturday, Halifax Repair Cafe and CanRepair put on a free event together at Veith House in Halifax. Maritimers were able to bring anything they needed repaired with no appointment necessary. “People just come bring their item, we register them and then they go sit with a volunteer face to face and talk through how it’s going to work with the repair and what we can do, and what we can’t do, and then we hopefully have a repaired item at the end that they can take home,” says Servaes. Tinkering with textiles Halifax Repair Cafe has been operating since June. People can volunteer to help, including Jocelyn Walker who is a repair artist using her time to help stitch. She is always using her talent at various events throughout Nova Scotia, and Saturday was her first time helping at the Halifax Repair Cafe. “What I’m doing today is repairing textiles, using patching, darning, sashiko and other kinds of basic hand sewing methods,” says Walker. She doesn’t like seeing anything go to waste if it’s something she can fix. She says fixing things is satisfying and low stakes since whatever people bring is already broken, so the worst case is it remains broken and the best case is it gets fixed. “Socks are my favourite, even socks that people are wearing. I have taken socks right off my friends’ feet and been like, ‘You can’t wear that. I have to fix it right now.’ I fix a lot of jeans like the inner thighs of jeans, which always go. It’s something that’s actually really easy to fix. I can fix that in about half an hour,” says Walker. ‘We will do our best’ The Halifax Repair Cafe has an 80 per cent success rate so chances are if you bring an item, it can likely be fixed. “It’s a free event for anyone who wants to come here and we will do our best,” says Servaes. It has volunteers who work with technology and electronics while others stitch and sew for a living. Some like Illona Inmaa, who is the owner of Mable & Rose, and volunteered her skills Saturday for the first time. She specializes in handmade and upcycled costume jewelry. On Saturday, she helped with anything from clasps needing repair to jewels falling off to chains. “I am here today because I believe it’s really important to repair what we have. Love what you wear and choose to repair because we have so much in the world and we don’t need as much and there is so much we can honour that we already own,” says Inmaa. She says there is a gap in the repair services for everyday wear jewelry which is where she steps in to help. Inmaa now plans to attend the monthly events at the Keshen Goodman Public Library to lend her expertise. “When we think of costume jewelry, we think big flashy pieces but costume jewelry is also anything we wear daily that is not necessarily fine metal. So, I repair everything from restringing pearls to putting new clasps on things too. I have a whole bag of jewelry that’s full of broken jewelry that is all little rhinestones. So, rhinestones pop out of the glued set and pop out of pieces, so I replace the rhinestones,” says Inmaa. Keeping items out of landfills Donna Mitchell lives in Halifax and heard about the event online. Despite not having anything she needed repaired at the moment, she wanted to come see what it was all about. “I got a lot of information for me. I am a big recycler too, so it was just a lot to come for the information and to see how popular it’s going to be, which is really great to see all these people. As a society, we throw too many things away, so I’m big into repairing, reusing,” says Mitchell. Others like Sharon Legere from Halifax also stopped by on Saturday with items she needed fixed. She says it’s important to have events like this, especially from an environmental standpoint. “I am just excited about the opportunity to actually fix something instead of tossing it into a landfill,” says Legere. The Halifax Repair Cafe hopes to continue having monthly events and would love to expand to multiple locations across the municipality. “So, people never have to worry, people can always come and know that their stuff can be repaired,” says Servaes For those looking to get items fixed, they can stop by the monthly events at Keshen Goodman Library. The next one is Sunday, Oct. 18. It is also accepting donations through its website for those looking to donate. For more Nova Scotia news, visit our dedicated provincial page
