An expert on sustainability and the founder of the highly successful Farnham Repair Café has launched a new initiative to launch more repair cafes across Surrey and over the Hampshire border.

Martin Charter, director of the University for the Creative Arts (UCA) Centre for Sustainable Design, has set up the Greater Surrey Repair Cafe Network. 

He said the aim was “to share knowledge, experience, and information related to the organisation and delivery of repair cafes in the region”.

Together with Farnham, there are 27 repair cafes in the greater Surrey area, including in Guildford, Aldershot, Woking, and Sutton.

With the creation of the network, Martin hopes this will encourage even more repair cafes to open and join.

The team at Meon Valley Repair Cafe in Hampshire said: “Learning from the great ideas and mistakes of other repair cafes dramatically speeds up the launching of new ones and the maturation of existing ones. 

“It can also tap into skills and experience a local group may not have access to.”

Meeting regularly, the network shares best practices, exchanges knowledge, and tackles challenges through in-person sessions and a WhatsApp group.

Godalming Repair Cafe added: “Learning from the great ideas and mistakes of others dramatically speeds up the launching of new repair cafes and the maturation of existing ones.”

Martin said: “Comparing notes on how different repair cafes resolve issues adds to the learning of the whole group and improves the community, and new practices like skill sharing are adopted quicker. 

“Also, being part of a community drives more energy in our individual repair cafes.”

If you are interested in joining the network, email: [email protected] with information about your repair cafe.

To learn more about the Centre for Sustainable Design, visit its website https://cfsd.org.uk/projects/

Farnham Repair Cafe (https://frc.cfsd.org.uk/) returns this Saturday, from 10am to 1pm at The Spire Church in South Street.