The joy of repairing things

When something breaks, we generally tend to replace it with a new one rather than repair it. Catelijne Elzes took the ‘repairing path’ for a month, and it turned out to be more complicated than she expected – but also more fun.

From the moment that I started, it was like a switch had been flipped in my head. Instead of my usual knee-jerk response to a broken object – to take myself off to the shops – I  began to wonder how I could make something whole again. I even found myself hoping for the next thing to break. It didn’t take long: A wooden planter box on our balcony fell apart. I started by moving the box, and promptly two more planks gave way.

Surely I could fix them all back into place? But it took some effort to figure out how. I needed a hammer and nails, and they were stashed in away in the attic. Then, when I hit the first nail in, the plank split in two. But after that I got the hang of it. And fifteen minutes later the planter box was looking good and sturdy again. That saved me a three-hour trip to Ikea (and quite a bit of money – not only the cost of the planter but all the other stuff I inevitably end up buying when I go there).