Building a World of Repair for London Repair Week
- Franki Appleton
- Mar 2
- 5 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
Blog by Franki Appleton
The Wheel Project Manager
It’s Repair Week! This year we have been exploring how we can build a world of repair at a local and national level, with a repair panel discussion in Wimbledon and our popular The Wheel Repair Cafe in Mitcham.
First launched in 2020 by ReLondon, Repair Week is now in its sixth year. The popularity of repairing has seen a significant revival and is on the rise, driven by concerns over the cost of living and what people feel is an increasingly "throwaway" culture.
Our Repair Week events focused on how we can all build a world of repair, whether that’s changing our mindset on repair, learning new repair skills, writing to our MPs to support Right to Repair policy, or seeking out brands that offer repair services and spare parts.
Repair Saves Valuable Resources and Money
According to new research commissioned by ReLondon and published ahead of Repair Week 2026, 335 million items (6 items per person) which could have been repaired are being thrown away every year, with textiles and electricals topping the chart for most commonly binned items. This is a terrible waste of resources, and increases environmental harm as new materials must be mined and farmed to make brand new replacement items.
In the past year, volunteer fixers at our six Repair Cafes repaired 87 items out of the 121 items brought to us. Imagine if those 87 items had been considered irreparable and thrown away! This would have created 203 kg of unnecessary electronic and textile waste.
The ReLondon research has also revealed two in three (64%) people in the UK say they have spent around £277 a year replacing items they think could have been repaired. Our data also shows the money saving potential of repairing instead of replacing. From our last six Repair Cafes, attendees estimated how much money they had saved coming to the community repair events. The combined total saving across six events was £2,538.
Repair is a Green Skill
ReLondon's research found that most people are ready to have a go at a whole range of repairs, from changing a plug (48%) to replacing a button (49%). Mending clothes and other textiles is also one of the most popular forms of repair (47%):
413 million repairs are done to mend clothing or textiles, from sewing a button on to mending a seam
66 million plugs have been changed
42 million broken headphone ports have been fixed
However, for those who say they don’t repair their stuff, it’s the lack of skills that are getting in the way. Lots of people learnt to repair from their parents (47%), with online tutorials, TikTok and YouTube also proving very popular (31%). Attending a repair workshop was also considered a great way of learning a new skill and an opportunity to meet new people (52% of those surveyed).
At our Fixing Our Future panel discussion, our expert panellist, Dermot Jones, talked about community skills sharing to build confidence in attempting your own repairs. Dermot co-leads the Tooting Repair Rooms and the Tooting Repair Club, where people can begin to learn how to fix electrical items in a safe and supportive environment. Panellist Ali Clifford, a stylist who leads workshops on darning and repairing knitwear, also shared the importance of teaching repair skills, explaining,
“Repair is essential, not just for reducing waste but for fostering creativity and empowering individuals. In a world where we often feel disconnected from the process of making and maintaining, teaching these skills is a way of reclaiming control over our environment and our lives. Repair is a way of slowing down, appreciating what we have, and taking pride in making something with our own hands.”
Come along to community repair events, including Sustainable Merton's The Wheel’s Repair Cafes, and social sewing drop-in sessions at the Preloved Studio, where our talented volunteers can show you fixing techniques and boost your repair skills. Take a look at our upcoming event dates here.
Repair is Political
Another of our brilliant panellists explained how legislation can build a world of repair. Josie Ball, the London Network Lead at The Restart Project, shared some of the barriers community repairers face when attempting repair on fixable items. This includes lack of access to spare parts, or the high cost of spare parts, lack of repair guidance documentation and specialist tools, and product designs that increasingly make disassembly impossible. The new barrier being faced when trying to repair “smart” electronics with integrated tech is that some companies use software in devices to prevent professionals and DIYers from fixing them.
There is a global movement to remove these barriers to repair. The Right to Repair movement aims to make sure everyone has the right to fix the products they own. It aims to change regulations on how these things are made in the first place, to make them easy and affordable to repair, as well as to expand our rights after purchase.
The Restart Project is calling for UK politicians to make it easier for everyone to repair and reuse the products we rely on every day. They are asking the UK government to make repair more affordable, expand the UK’s Right to Repair, introduce a repair index, bring in targets for reuse and repair and support a new generation of repairers. You can read more about these policies here.
The Restart Project has published a Repair and Reuse Declaration, asking MPs, businesses, national organisations, and community repair groups to add their support. Sustainable Merton is proud to be a signatory to this declaration. You can check to see if your MP supports this declaration, and ask them to sign if they have not already.
Repair is Good for Business
There are some businesses who are already transitioning to a circular economy model including repair before extended producer responsibility regulations are brought in. Recent research by WRAP found that for every five times people repair existing items of clothing, four new items of clothing are ‘displaced’ by people no longer buying them. By working repair services into their post-sales offerings, fashion businesses such as The North Face and Patagonia can support a more sustainable industry while retaining their customers through this additional repair service.
Sarah Robins, our expert panellist from global NGO, WRAP, is a textiles specialist working with companies who want to lead the sector with these circular business models. Sarah explained how repair is a great entry point to a circular economy for businesses, as they can offer in-house repair services linked to existing warranty programmes. Sarah’s work is about helping organisations grow their circular activities, keep products and materials in use for longer, and build value in ways that go beyond revenue.
Through all these pathways communities, governments, and businesses are building a world of repair. Everyone can be part of this movement towards a circular economy, and there are many ways to get involved:
Change Minds - Share your repair wins with friends and neighbours to encourage them to choose repair
Learn Skills - Join a repair event or workshop to grow your repair skills
Campaign for Change - Write to your MP to encourage support for expanding UK ‘Right to Repair’ legislation
Conscious Consumption - Support brands already making repair part of their business model
Our Repair Week events were made possible with funding from the London Borough of Merton’s Community Climate Action Fund and the Civic Pride: Investing in Neighbourhoods Fund.
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