Today, at the Palo Alto Repair Café, a team of nine sewists take on a high volume of ripped seams, fraying hems and broken zippers. Sonne Lemke, occasionally pausing to offer her expert advice to a younger sewist, watches over them all as she irons a patch onto a ripped pair of pants.
Lemke joined the Repair Café movement not as the expert volunteer sewist she is now, but as a patron. Tagging along with her friend, who was hoping to get her sewing machine fixed, she spotted a lone sewist, drowning in an influx of clothing repairs. Without hesitation, she sat down behind her friend’s newly repaired machine and volunteered to help with the repairs. Now, as the leader of the clothing repair department, she coordinates a growing team, working together to breathe new life into well-loved clothing.
Founded 18 years ago, Repair Café is a worldwide movement that started in the Netherlands.
“The main mission [of the Repair Café] is to keep things out of the landfill,” Maia Coladonato, who currently leads the Palo Alto branch, said. “The secondary mission … is to pass down fixer skills, because that’s something that we’re losing.”
Repair Cafés are held at multiple sites across the Bay Area, often in libraries and community centers. Palo Alto’s Repair Café is held at the Museum of American Heritage in Downtown Palo Alto. The initial Bay Area branch of the Repair Café, which the organization considers to be the first of its kind in the United States, was founded by Peter Skinner, a Stanford University graduate, but has since been taken over by Coladonato.
Coladonato joined the initiative in 2013. Since then, Repair Café has expanded into Palo Alto, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara and San Jose.
Many of the volunteers, called “fixers,” have backgrounds in engineering. Irene Yang, an electrical engineer, said that she volunteers at the Repair Café to fix electronics because she enjoys helping others understand how things work.
“There’s a lot of design and thought that gets put into all of these electronic objects that I really hope that everybody can get an understanding of when they talk to the fixers,” Yang said.
Apart from fixing bikes and electronics, the Café also focuses on mending clothes. According to Lemke, her love of repairing clothing began as a child, as she grew up in a family that valued repairing things instead of throwing them away.
“The mentality was that you figured out how things work and you put them back together,” Lemke said. “My mother was an excellent seamstress, and so she passed those skills on.”
Lemke said that she finds the job rewarding because she gets to give people an opportunity to give new life to their damaged clothes, with some being especially sentimental.
“That first thing that I worked on … the bag that I fixed was her [the patron’s] son’s from the Rio Olympics,” Lemke said. “And so it was old, but it also meant a lot to her, and that’s the thing I like to see — that something, some item that’s a favorite, can be put back into use and worn.”
While many of the fixers who volunteer at the Repair Café are retired or working professionals, the organization appeals to all ages. Selene Bruyere, a junior at Homestead High School, got involved with the Repair Café after being inspired by her father, an experienced fixer, and began working as his apprentice.
“You really get to put your mind to work and figure things out, because at school, when they give you problems, it’s like, ‘okay, whatever,’” Bruyere said. “But here, it’s fun. You’re helping someone. You’re fixing things, and it’s awesome.”
Through the apprentice program, the Repair Café recruits young fixers from local middle schools, high schools and colleges to train under experienced fixers. According to Coladonato, the program serves as a learning experience for all, mentors and apprentices alike.
“They can exchange ideas, they can collaborate,” Coladonato said. “They can bounce ideas off of each other, like ‘what do you think the problem is here?’ … Having that exchange, I think, is really important, and that helps everybody learn how to fix more things.”
The community that has formed around the Repair Café events has grown very strong, according to Coladonato. Their growing network of fixers is a testament to the importance of giving back to the community.
“This community of people that does the fixing, they’re awesome,” Coladonato said. “They are just so knowledgeable, they’re resourceful and they’re just kind and generous with their time. … They’re fixing these items for people they don’t even know, and it’s just so cool to me. It’s an honor to be a part of.”
