Repair Cafe
Makerspace Urbana
A Repair Cafe is where you can bring your broken things and we will assist you however we can to get that thing working again! We believe that the best way to understand something and how it works is to take a look inside it, usually by working with someone to repair it. Repairing things is also sustainable and cost effective – older things are often better made, and keeping something from a landfill by bringing it back to life is always a better answer. At the same time it teaches engineering skills that enable people of all ages to be more self sufficient!
Why show up?
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Repair something you own
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Help someone else repair something (mentor)
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Shadow a mentor and pick up fixin’ skills
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Socialize with like-minded folks
We have an entire blog post on how we got started if you’re interested in hearing the story. We also have a post with a detailed description of how we operate.
What can you bring? Anything! Clothes, kitchen appliances, electronics, toys, tools, blankets, lawn care equipment, coffee tables, and whatever else you can bring in.
When: Third Thursday of each month, 7pm – 9pm
Where: The Makerspace Urbana, which is in the IMC. The ramp entrance is on the north side, and the stairs are on the south side next to the bicycle parking. See the image below for details. In the map below, blue shows car parking, red shows bus stops and bicycle parking, and follow the green lines to get into the IMC.
All repair assistance is done by unpaid volunteers. The entire operation is supported by voluntary donations of tools, materials, or cash!
What is not allowed? Dumping broken objects and leaving. Please respect the time of our mentors. We are here to teach people how to repair things. If you want someone to fix something for you without being involved in the repair, please take it to a repair shop and pay the person for their work. If you have something that is broken that you’d like to see fixed and given away, we’d recommend listing it on a site like Freecycle, making it clear that it’s broken and that the Repair Cafe would be happy to help the recipient try to fix it.
People have been excited about the Repair Cafe and asking how they can help, so we collected a list of things that you can do:
Spread the word!
- Download and fliers here. Print them or post them online.
- Bring something that is broken to get fixed
- Come help others fix random things (it’s actually pretty fun)
- Become a member of the Makerspace to keep our venue going
- They’ve provided the space and all the tools and materials to get us started
- Coming in and helping organize the space counts as sweat equity!
- The Makerspace will make future tool purchases
Donate tools
- Drill bits larger than 1/2″ that can be used on wood or metal (twist bits, not spade bits)
Donate materials. Some things we could use for next month include:
- Small hinges
You may be wondering, OK, how do I donate supplies? Ideally, bring them in during open hours. This works the best for us, as someone will already be there to take it and put it in the correct place. If you can’t make any of our open hours, email repaircafe at makerspaceurbana dot org and we will try to coordinate something.
Finally, if you’re interested in doing some behind-the-scenes work, you can join the mailing list. We’ve not really used it much yet, but the intent is that this would be for things like figuring out if we know anyone who can get an article in Smile Politely, how to reach out to various groups (and ideally only have one person do so), who is willing and able to go on the radio to talk about the repair cafe, how we reach fellow environmentalists, people who want to save money, or people who just don’t want to support big companies any more than they have to. Strategic planning. People are welcome to lurk on there and just jump in when they hear something that interests them (e.g. radio, newspapers, boys & girls clubs, neighborhood associations).
