Repair Café Glasgow, Toy Hospital
Glasgow · Glasgow
A free volunteer repair café with a strand it calls the Toy Hospital. Their framing is the useful one: a soft toy is a good first repair to attempt yourself, and somebody will start you off or talk you through it so you can do it next time. Textiles volunteers at every café.
Getting hold of them
- Their own site
- You can walk in at Glasgow
They work from their own form, so start there.
If it gets lost
Not stated
This is a blank on their page, not an answer from them. We have never asked anybody in this trade the question. Of the 185 businesses we have read, 4 have written anything down about losing an item: 2 say it is insured, 2 say the risk is yours. The other 181 are silent, and silence is not a policy either way.
If you would rather not have to phrase it
“Before I send it, can I ask what happens if it gets lost or damaged while it’s with you? I’m not trying to catch you out, it just can’t be replaced. Whatever the answer is, could you put it in an email so I’ve got it in writing?”
“No, we don’t cover it” is a fine answer to get. It tells you to insure the post yourself for the full amount, both ways.
If it is lost or damaged
Their website does not say what happens if your item is lost or damaged while they have it.
Ask before you post anything you could not replace. Only four of the businesses we hold publish an answer to this.
What they take on
- Mending and seams
- Restuffing
- Eyes and noses
What they won’t do
The part every other directory leaves out. None of this is a criticism. It is how you avoid three wasted weeks.
- Repairs only, no cleaning
- Won't accept anything by post until they give you a date to send it
Their exact words on what they refuse
Quoted from their own pages, unedited, because a paraphrase of a refusal is the kind of thing you find out was wrong three weeks in.
- “Mending soft toys can be the perfect opportunity for you to have a go at taking part in the repair as they often involve a bit of hand sewing.”
Their published prices
- Everythingfrom £0
Getting it there
- Drop-off only, no post
- You can bring it in
- Works on site. It does not go away with them.
Money
- Fixed menu of prices, so you know before you send it
Anything else they say
- The UK had no free community option in this list at all before this.
- Volunteers with sewing machines, not restorers. Right for a split seam on something modern and wrong for anything jointed, antique or irreplaceable.