Karen Farrington - The Repair Shop: Tales from the Workshop of Dreams

Karen Farrington

Karen Farrington is an author, ghost-writer, editor and researcher for a range of leading UK publishers. She has written more than 40 books, including the Springwatch Almanac, The Ambridge Chronicles, and Great Lives, as well as for national magazines and newspapers.

Jay Blades

Jay Blades is a TV Presenter, Social Entrepreneur, Community leader and furniture designer. He co-founded the award winning social organisation Out of The Dark, a charity dedicated to teaching disadvantaged youngsters practical skills. Jay is best known for his furniture up-cycling on BBC Ones Money For Nothing and as presenter of the award-winning BBC Two series The Repair Shop.

With special thanks to The Repair Shops experts for their contributions to this book.

No matter how damaged, there is always a way to bring the things you love back to life.

Having worked on The Repair Shop, Ive learnt everything that has a past can have a beautiful future too. We have experts who will lavish time and expertise on items that might otherwise be thrown onto the scrap heap. And some things are too precious to be discarded, not because they are worth lots of money, but for the memories they evoke of an era thats gone but not forgotten. Here in the workshop, theres never a time when objects are written off for being too difficult or time-consuming to fix.

Our experts are extraordinary. All of them are undisputed masters of their craft but its more than that. When objects in need of repair turn up on their work benches, it is mostly broad experience, but also a bit of intuition, that leads them to make choices about how to best bring something back to life. When theres doubt, there are plenty of other people to consult who share the same deep-rooted concern for conservation. Thats a well of knowledge that will never run dry.

Watching talented hands do exquisite work never grows old with viewers, who can pick up tips and techniques for restoration projects of their own. But in addition, there are the compelling stories attached to each item, which range from romantic and sentimental to downright terrifying. Well-worn objects can be a symbol of courage or a badge of honour, a memorial to an ancestor or a reminder of a way of life that few know. Sometimes the stories chime with each of us, resurrecting a buried memory from childhood. But it might be a tale so tailored to one family it leaves us awe-inspired about what others have confronted in times more treacherous than our own. History teaches us how lessons from the past can arm us for tomorrow. All of us want to celebrate our heritage and this is an ideal way to do it.

In the show, there are plenty of moments charged with raw emotion. Its very daunting for contributors to come before cameras when theyve probably never been on television before and they often get caught by the feelings that well up inside.

Forgetting all about the cameras, we respond with a listening ear because it is beautiful to hear their stories. We dont know how they are going to react or what might trigger tears, but its good to connect with something at their core.

At the big reveal, the experts are also nervous, hoping their nuanced approach proves the right one with the owner. Im happy to say that they are not only almost always on target but are scoring bulls-eyes. Our craftspeople always fall a little bit in love with an item while they work on it, too. Theres nostalgia, certainly, and sometimes we all end up feeling sentimental together, but whatever the responses shown on screen, they all run deep.

Everyone has a story to tell. For those who can link their family history to a symbolic object, we at The Repair Shop can play a role in its retelling. We feel privileged at becoming a small part of that history.

Jay Blades

Vera McKenzie had her small feet planted firmly on the gently rolling deck as she gazed at the grey outline of Englands south coast pressing into view. Expectant and anxious, she was one of thousands who came from the West Indies in answer to a clarion call for workers to rebuild Britain following the Second World War and she was confident of a warm welcome from a mother country in dire need. But she was worried that husband Herbert, or Mack, who had made the same journey nine months previously, would not be on the dockside to meet her. If he wasnt there, how would she carry a precious possession that had accompanied her on the voyage down the gangplank and off the docks?

When Vera left Kingston, Jamaica, aged 34, she was forced to part with almost all her possessions, being restricted to just a suitcase of clothing. But in that torment of stark choices, she found she couldnt contemplate leaving her cherished pump organ behind. The hefty instrument, also known as a reed organ or harmonium, is a cousin to the accordion and Veras had been presented to her by a music teacher. Its sound had become a mainstay of her leisure time, which would endure at the heart of her family and religious life. Only when a well-meaning home fix ended in disaster many years later would it be silenced. Years after that, thanks to the skills of the team at the Repair Shop, it was finally brought back to life in time to mark the centenary of Veras birth.

But now, with the ship edging its way into the Solent, Veras heart was racing as she considered what she might do if she found herself alone at Southampton. Bulky and heavy, the pump organ was too difficult for Vera to lift with her slight frame. Indeed, it really needed two willing men grappling with the handles at each end to shift it.

Until now, her progress through life had been sure-footed. But post-cards sent by Vera even as the voyage to Britain was underway reveal a new tremor of uncertainty.

One dispatched as the ship toured the Caribbean picking up passengers in July 1954 revealed she thought her destination was London. Dear Mackie, I am still keeping well darling. Just praying that we will land safe. Keep well till I get there and try to find out when we are reaching London.

A week later, another was sent from Bermuda, by which time she was not convinced of her journeys end. I dont know if we will go to shore, for we didnt in Cuba, but everything is alright up to now. I wish you could find out where we are landing in England and meet me there instead of London. Be good darling. It was signed simply V.

However, as the stout ships ropes were secured at the docks her concerns fell away when Macks unmistakable outline became visible in the crowd. The pump organ had survived its month-long 4,600-mile journey unscathed.

Veras story begins in Siloah, Jamaica, in March 1920, where she was the product of an illicit love affair. Her father was Alexander Jhagroo, the son of an indentured worker from India, who laboured on the renowned Appleton Sugar Estate. When Vera was a toddler, her mother Mary Mundy was sent away to Costa Rica to work, to escape the perceived shame of being an unmarried mother in a strongly Presbyterian household. Veras last memory of her mother was being bathed by her in a sunny courtyard, with Mary singing Yes, we have no bananas. Although later they wrote to one another regularly, the pair never met again. While her father went on to marry someone else he remained supportive of Vera as she grew up and she became close to her half-siblings.