Every year, our local councils collect a total of 536,000,000kg ‘hard rubbish’ - including furniture, e-waste bikes and more - from households around Australia in their kerbside collections.  

The vast bulk of that ‘rubbish’ (or 440 million kilograms) ends up in landfill each year, polluting our soil and waterways, and generating carbon emissions contributing to climate change.

That’s the equivalent in weight of 4.5 million two person sofas, heading for landfill each year. 

Repair and reuse is a key solution to this mounting environmental crisis - keeping items that can be simply repaired in use and out of landfill for longer.

But for many people, repair is not seen as a convenient, realistic or affordable option. Here at the Bower, we’re working to change that!  

Donate today to help us raise the $10,000 we need to establish our new Community Repair Shop - an interactive workshop where residents from across Sydney and beyond can come to bring items to be repaired. items which otherwise would end up as ‘rubbish’ destined for landfill 

Cruise through the suburbs of Sydney on an average weekend and it’s not hard to come across the teetering piles of ‘hard rubbish’ spilling over nature strips and kerbs awaiting collection. 

These mini-mountains will often contain sofas, chairs, wardrobes, tables, drawers and other typical household furniture, ‘e-waste’ such as fridges, microwaves, toasters and lamps, unwanted bikes, musical instruments and much, much more - all the ‘everyday stuff’ which clutters our lives.   

Look more closely, and you might notice a lot of these discarded items don’t seem to have much wrong with them that can’t be fixed with a little time, attention and expertise - a little tear in the upholstery or a wobbly chair leg, a rusty chain or a punctured tyre on a bike, a broken electric wire which can be soldered back to working order. 

But these types of repairs are only simple if you know how, if you have the tools and the time, or if you have an affordable and convenient place to take the item for repair. 

With your help, we will establish The Bower Community Repair Shop as a one-stop shop for all of these repairs which will be the first in Australia, and a model for a future network of community repair shops, bringing together expertise and dedication to the art of repair. 
 
Our team of 20 technicians and skilled craftspersons will repair and re-upholster furniture and wooden items, re-wire and fix electrical items, as well as repair bicycles, clothing and more.  

Our bespoke furniture repairs restore and repair furniture to its previous glory - anything from tables, chairs, bedroom furniture, cupboards, benches, and outdoor furniture.

Furniture makes up a large volume of landfill items, and extending its life helps to preserve our native forests, as well boosting community wellbeing by keeping alive treasured items and family heirlooms, and traditional craftsmanship. 

Our bike mechanics are experts at getting people back on two wheels. We will tune up cobwebbed frames or gears, patch up a puncture or realign the wheels and get people back on the road in the shortest possible time, another great win for the environment!

The Community Repair Shop will also have dedicated sessions for sewing repairs and clothes swaps - which have proven extremely popular in the current economic climate - while drawing more attention to the pollution and human rights issues relating to ‘fast clothing’. 

Empowering people to do their own repairs

The Bower Community Repair Shop will house a fully equipped workshop where benches can be used by members of the public to undertake their own repairs.

This is particularly useful for people with the knowhow but without space in an apartment or small house to undertake repairs. 

With your help, The Community Repair Shop will foster and keep alive age-old repair traditions in the community.  

Fostering a culture of repair has always been at the heart of the Bower’s mission to reduce landfill and care for our fragile planet.  It’s in our name – The Bower Reuse and Repair Centre  – and for the past 25 years since, our foundation has informed our practice in promoting a more sustainable way of living.   

Join us at the forefront of a new Repair Movement in Australia tackling our climate crisis and bringing communities closer - .Help us turn the dream of a Community Repair Shop from dream to reality.