We are sharing our 2025 results and impact. Since 2023 we have been recording what items we help repair and upcycling at our sessions over the year. This means at the end of the year we can see what impact we have had so here’s our 2025 results and impact.
For 2025 Ealing Repair Café achievements have been:
492 items saved from going to waste, plus all the water and carbon savings from not buying new items. 215 people helped to mend and take care of the clothes. We achieved this by attending 49 events at 26 locations. Gained the The King’s Award for Voluntary Service. We look forward to 2026 when we get to attend events celebrating our success.
Our 2025 data illustrates a wide range of sewing, mending, upcycling, and teaching activities was carried out across the year. This covers clothing repair, textile upcycling, community education, and practical support for individuals and families. The volume and diversity shows a highly active, community‑centred repair service with strong emphasis on skill‑sharing and sustainability.
In addition to this data we have collected at our events, we also know that people are learning from our online content, with over 1.4k followers on Facebook, our Instagram and over 400 on our email list, subscribe here. We love that some people pop to a session or message us, telling us how they have continued to mend their clothes and sending photos for updates.
Mary had a mum come up to her after learning how to patch her jeans that she has continued to mend things. On our Facebook page, the mum saw how Mary had repaired a drinks holder on a rucksack. She did a similar mend for her daughters and has been teaching her friends to do the same.
So the impact is greater than just these stats, we know there are more out there we would love to include! Our aim is giving people skills for life and that they can pass it onto friends and family who will also be fixing and mending.
For a full history of Ealing Repair cafe and about how we got here, look at About us.
Ealing Repair Café Most Frequent Activities
From our data, we can see most frequent activities we help with at our sessions.
- 35% of mends involve Jeans & trousers: This is great for the environment as it takes approx. 7,500 litres of water to make 1 pair of jeans. Look at Mends for Jeans for inspiration and help
- Tops, shirts, blouses, and jumpers account for 25% of our mends and moth-eaten jumpers were frequently darned or patched. We have our Darning and Patching page to help you get started.
- 22% of mends were for non-clothing items the most popular was bags but also a couple of bedspreads and wool blankets. Many of the bag fixes were zips. There is some great tips from Oxfam to fix a zipper. Invest in a zip fixing kit, there are quite a few on the market.
- Upcycled a lot of t-shirts and jeans into draft excluders and t-shirt bags. We also made yarn that was used to braid into bracelets for 116 happy kids through the year. We hope this provides the inspiration to make the best use of what we already have. Take a look at our Upcycling Clothes & Textiles Projects on how to make t-shirt yarn and drawstring bags from your favourite and old tshirts.
- Teaching and demonstrations: We love showing people how we can make the most of our clothes and textiles. If you are interested you can book us for a workshop
The Duchess
This year we had the Duchess join the team. Its a beautiful hand-powered singer sewing machine and is a real draw for our events.
So many people have come over at our events admiring her and remember mums, grandmas who had one and its sound when sewing bringing back so many memories. The brilliant thing is its quieter than the electrical machines so we can use it in our library sessions without disturbing the peace of the library!
We are so lucky that our community are thinking of us when they are having a clearout. We have been able to rehome over 10 sewing machines. We also help people who are struggling with their sewing machines with Sewing machine Servicing and Care and our Ealing Sewing machine lessons for structured lessons for making and creating items.
If you are having a clear-out of sewing equipment we do appreciate any sewing needles, threads and fabric scraps. For larger fabric, we suggest donating them to local schools and nurseries as we all have a large fabric stash!
Ealing Repair Cafe Community Impact
Our community impact from our events includes:
- Reduces textile waste
- Builds repair confidence in our communities
- Supports low‑income families with essential clothing repairs
- Encourages sustainable habits
- Provides creative, hands‑on learning for children and adults
- Strengthens community connections through shared making
- Helps with mental health by provided a space for mindfulness with chat and calming activities.
Ealing Repair Cafe 2025 Repairs
The variety and issues people pop in with is vast so here is a word cloud of the themes that come out from our repairs and activities.
Our focus in our sessions is on repairing, mending and upcycling clothing and fabric items to keep in circulation the textiles that are out there. We occasionally get people wanting sewing lessons and we put together this list Ealing Sewing machine lessons for structured lessons for making and creating items.
🪡 Clothing Repairs
General Garment Repairs
- Hemming: trousers, shirts, dresses, sleeves
- Seam repairs: trousers, dresses, shorts, joggers, shirts
- Button work: sewing on buttons, replacing buttons, repairing buttonholes
- Zip repairs: fixing, replacing, advising on alternatives (e.g., piggyback zips)
- Elastic replacement: waistbands, straps, neckline adjustments
- Lining repairs: coats, jackets, skirts
Knitwear Repairs
- Darning holes in jumpers, cardigans, sweaters, merino and fine knits
- Moth hole repairs
- Collar reattachment
- Sleeve repairs
- Swiss darning and decorative darning
Outerwear & Accessories
- Jacket tears mended
- Leather strap repairs
- Rucksack and bag repairs
- Hat repairs (bobble hats, knitted hats)
- Scarf repairs and popper additions
🪡 Upcycling & Creative Projects
We have developed our Upcycling Clothes & Textiles Projects and these feature highly in our statistics.
T‑Shirt Upcycling
- T‑shirt yarn making
- T‑shirt yarn bracelets
- T‑shirt bags (multiple)
- Teaching children and adults how to upcycle T‑shirts
Larger Upcycling Projects
- Denim draught excluders (made, stuffed, and donated)
- Tank top transformed into a shopping bag
- Purse upcycling
- Denim skirt conversion
Embroidery & Decorative Work
Embroidery is a great way to repair, disguise mends and add a little personal touch to your clothes.
- Embroidery lessons to learn basic stitches and techniques
- Embroidery stitches practiced such as cross stitch, running stitch and roses
- Embroidered ladybird on a jumper
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