Ealing Repair Cafe receives The King’s Award for Voluntary Service

Ealing Repair Café, a group of volunteers based in Ealing have been awarded The King’s Award for Voluntary Service for 2025.

Ealing Repair Café’s primary focus is to encourage and facilitate clothes and textiles mending to inspire and encourage people to get the most out of their clothes.

We also create and teach upcycling projects to make something useful out of otherwise unwanted fabrics, (e.g. draught excluders, t-shirt bags). Items we create are donated to local groups such as food banks, churches, Age UK Ealing.

Ealing Repair Café is part of the Ealing Transition initiative, which focuses on re-inventing the way we use energy and produce energy. This includes the way we source our food, our clothes, design our buildings, generate power and much more.

Ceremonies and celebration for Kavs

We enjoyed many ceremonies and celebrations for KAVs. Our final ceremony brought all four of us together. Ealing Repair Café was honoured to attend a special celebration at the Polska YMCA in Ealing, where we were presented with The King’s Award for Voluntary Service alongside the Polish YMCA.

The award was presented by Richard Kornicki CBE DL, Representative Deputy Lieutenant for the London Borough of Ealing. Richard mentioned that we were the smallest and they were the biggest group in this year’s Kings Voluntary award. Plus all 4 of us volunteers were in attendance which doesnt happen often!

The evening was a wonderful celebration of volunteering, community spirit and cultural heritage. We enjoyed a beautiful performance by Fiotki, whose programme of traditional Polish songs and poetry delighted everyone in attendance.

A particular highlight was a fascinating tour of the YMCA’s costume department, where we learned about the care and dedication involved in preserving the extensive collection of traditional costumes worn by the Mazury Dance Company. Seeing the craftsmanship and history behind these costumes gave us a real appreciation for the volunteers who work so hard to keep these traditions alive.

We would like to thank the Polish YMCA for their warm hospitality and extend our congratulations on receiving The King’s Award for Voluntary Service. It was a privilege to share this special occasion and celebrate the incredible contribution that volunteers make to our communities.

We also were lucky enough to be invited to two other ceremonies. Yvonne and Jenny went to the Tower of London for the award ceremony to receive our award (see our Facebook post). Mary and Lone went off to Buckingham Palace Garden party (see our Facebook post), so we all got to celebrate our award. It was Lone’s birthday on the day of the garden party, what a way to celebrate!

Here are Yvonne and Jenny on their way to collecting the Kings Award for Volunteering on behalf of Ealing Repair Cafe at the Tower of London. Mary and Lone went to Buckingham Palace garden party, here they are with a view of the palace in the background.

This award belongs to all our volunteers, repairers, organisers and supporters who help Ealing Repair Café reduce waste, share skills and bring people together. Thank you for being part of our journey.

Ealing Repair Café is one of 231 local charities, social enterprises and voluntary groups to receive the prestigious award this year. Their work, along with others from across the UK, reminds us of all the ways fantastic volunteers are contributing to their local communities and working to make life better for those around them.

King’s Award for Voluntary Service

The King’s Award for Voluntary Service aims to recognise outstanding work by local volunteer groups to support their communities. It was created in 2002 to celebrate Her Late Majesty The Queen’s Golden Jubilee and was continued following the accession of His Majesty The King. 2025 marks the third year of The King’s Award for Voluntary Service. Recipients are announced annually on 14th November, The King’s Birthday.

Award winners this year are wonderfully diverse and include volunteer groups from across the UK, such as a group of dog walkers clearing up their local area in Kincardineshire; a group providing unique flying experiences for people with disabilities in Hampshire. A group providing support to veterans and their families across Welsh Valley communities; a group running a museum and non-profit railway In Belfast, preserving Northern Ireland’s railway heritage.

Mary Horesh said: “We’re proud to be recognised for the incredible efforts of our volunteers. We love supporting local communities in extending the life of garments, preventing items from ending up in landfill, and creating a welcoming space that participants say enhances their social and mental well-being.”

Notes

1. Lord-Lieutenants represent the monarch in each of the UK’s ceremonial counties.
2. This year there are 231 recipients of The King’s Award Voluntary Service from across the UK and Channel Islands.
3. More information on the recipients and the Award can be found at https://kavs.dcms.gov.uk/
4. Full details on how to nominate are available at https://kavs.dcms.gov.uk/  
5. Nominations for the 2026 award opened on the 1st September 2025.