Community Orgs On Campus Environment
Eau Claire Repair Fair Aims to Mend Community's Relationship to Sustainability
new event at UW-Eau Claire hopes to fix more than just broken belongings; connecting attendees to environmental consciousness and creativity
A new event at UW-Eau Claire aims to mend more than just broken belongings; it hopes to repair the community's relationship with sustainability.
The first-ever Eau Claire Repair Fair will take place from 10am to 3pm on Saturday, April 26, at the Davies Student Center (77 Roosevelt Ave, Eau Claire).
Jenna Vande Zande, user services and outreach staffer at McIntyre Library — and event lead for the repair fair — said the library’s Blugold Makerspace strives to bring people together, specifically connecting makers and creatives who have a problem with people who have a solution.
As a host of this event, the university library will amplify and disseminate these core values to a broader and more diverse audience, Vande Zande said.
“I love hearing new and exciting ways to do stuff from people who have more experience than me,” she said. “I'm hoping that through events like this, we can get more people like that in the same room.”
Jacob Hicks suggested this event can encourage people to think about their purchasing choices and consider repair and reuse alternatives. This will help to promote sustainable awareness both on campus and in the Eau Claire community, he said.
This all-ages (and free!) event features accessible creative workshops, including mending textiles, darning (repairing holes in knitted material), and a craft supplies swap. Local organizations that promote creative solutions and reuse will also be tabling at the event.
Metal and Wool, with a history of hand-mending clothes, and Evening Star Bazaar, a marketplace for sustainable products, are two community-driven organizations represented at the Eau Claire Repair Fair.
The event will also concentrate on the intersection of environmental health, economic prosperity, and social well-being, which serve as the three pillars of environmental work for the UW-Eau Claire Student Office of Sustainability (S.O.S.).
“Ultimately, we want to push projects and ideas that progress on all three of those fronts,” Jacob Hicks, student director of the S.O.S. said. “We see the Eau Claire Repair Fair has a pretty good way to do that.”
"Every bit of supplies that we can keep out of the landfill, connect with a new maker, have it created – maybe in a different way than it was initially intended – I love." –Jenna Vande Zande, event lead
The office of sustainability is a sponsor of the first-time event, along with funding supplied by the WiLS Ideas to Action Fund to McIntyre Library.
Hicks suggested this event can encourage people to think about their purchasing choices and consider repair and reuse alternatives. This will help to promote sustainable awareness both on campus and in the Eau Claire community, he said.
Vande Zande expressed her hope the Eau Claire Repair Fair will expand in the future to include more local makers and creatives, with a focus on mending, repair, and environmental awareness.
“Every bit of supplies that we can keep out of the landfill, connect with a new maker, have it created — maybe in a different way than it was initially intended — I love,” Vande Zande said.
For questions about the upcoming event – slated for Saturday, April 26 from 10am-3pm – or ways to get involved, contact the McIntyre Library staff through email at library@uwec.edu.
