Repair Café Conference
9th June 2023
University for the Creative Arts
Farnham
Surrey
Organised by The Centre for Sustainable Design (®) at the University for the Creative Arts in partnership with Repair Cafe Wales
Background
The 1st Repair Café was established in 2009 in the Netherlands as grassroots, community-led workshop aimed at extending the life of products. Since then, the number of repair cafes has expanded significantly. The Repair Cafe Foundation (RCF) highlights over 2600 Repair Cafes in the world, but there are many that are not registered on RCF site. For example, in England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales there are now estimated to be over 250 Repair Cafes with many new initiatives launching weekly. The pandemic curtailed a lot of activity, with some repair cafes halting activities and others adapting to CV19 and continuing to operate within the guidelines. With the ‘Right to Repair’ becoming a policy issue in Europe, US and UK, there are implications for repair cafes. Significant repair rates are being achieved by repair cafes: a global study in 2016 indicated that repairers had achieved an average 63% repair rate. In addition, to the environmental benefits, Repair Cafes are reinforcing the importance of social and community dimensions. As the concept of Circular Economy evolves, Repair Cafes are playing an increasingly important role at a local level.
This will be the 2nd UK Repair Café conference. The 1st was held in March 2020 the week before lockdown with over 80 repair cafes attending from throughout UK.
Target audience
The conference is focused on practical issues being faced by Repair Cafes and is targeted at trustees, managers, repairers and other volunteers; and will be suitable for those that are in start-up or more experienced Repair Cafes.
Event objectives
To highlight practical issues associated with running Repair Cafes including lessons learnt and best practice examples. In addition, the event will provide excellent networking opportunities for existing Repair Cafes or those that are considering setting up a Repair Cafe.
Agenda
The conference is co-chaired by:
Professor Martin Charter, Director and Chair, Board of Trustees, Farnham Repair Café, The Centre for Sustainable Design (®), Business School for the Creative Industries, University for the Creative Arts (UCA)
Phoebe Brown, Director, Repair Café Wales
10.00 Registration
10.30 Welcome
Professor Martin Charter, Director, The Centre for Sustainable Design ®, UCA and Chair, Board of Trustees, Farnham Repair Café
Phoebe Brown, Director, Repair Café Wales
Professor Mark Ellul, Chief Operating Officer, UCA
Alan Earwaker, Mayor of Farnham
10.45 Strategic Overview
Professor Martin Charter, Director, The Centre for Sustainable Design ®, UCA and Chair, Board of Trustees, Farnham Repair Café
11.00 Repair Cafes in the UK
Phoebe Brown, Director, Repair Café Wales
11.15 ‘Right to Repair’: Policy Update
Chris Robertson, Head of Product Regulatory Compliance, RINA
Q&A
11.45 Repair Cafés: Development, Management and Organisation
Martin Davies, Volunteer, Lover Repair Cafe – Case Study
Sandy Skelton, Cambridgeshire Repair Cafe Network – Case Study
Alex Rocha, Co-founder and Volunteer, Sutton Repair Cafe – Case Study
Panel discussion
12.45 Lunch and Networking
13.45 Roundtable Introduction: Key Issues and Product Repair
13.55 Roundtable #1: Key issues
A series of seven roundtables will be organised to discuss key issues being faced by Repair Cafes.
Discussion followed by short presentations by table hosts
15.10 Networking
15.35 Roundtable #2: Product Repair
A series of seven roundtables will be organised to discuss product repairs experiences. Each roundtable will have a table host/facilitator and notetaker, and each participant will be able to join three discussions.
Group discussions followed by short presentations and Q&A
16.50 Summing up and next actions
17.00 Close
* To be confirmed
** The programme may be subject to change
Registration
The event is free of charge but please email your name, position and Repair Cafe to Ros on rcarruthers@uca.ac.uk. More information is also attached here on travelling to the event and Farnham
Further information
For more information contact:
Ros Carruthers
The Centre for Sustainable Design ®
Business School for the Creative Industries
UCA
+44 (0) 1252 892772
Funding
Funding received from Research England QR Strategic Priorities Fund. Research England is part of UK Research and Innovation, a public body funded by the UK government. For more information visit www.ukri.org or re.ukri.org