Collingham and District Men in Sheds
Upcycling and repurposing wood
Who are you and what you do:
We are a professional/recreational group of guys who get together to produce and design and enhance many things. You name it we will do our best to do it, we enjoy a coffee round the table and enjoying the comradery of a friendly group.
We are passionate about passing on our diverse skills we try to teach where possible and we now run classes for both men and women. We are more than a hobby group but will not take on a job that can be done by a local craftsman. It is important that any task is enjoyable and will help the community as a whole.
We received £500 towards the purchase of a workshop bandsaw which allow us to reuse wood which would have otherwise gone to waste. We raised the additional funds required through the sale of the upcycled homeware items we make and repair and through fundraising.
What have you reduced, reused or recycled?
We are on a builders site so you can see there is a lot of wood that can be wasted, as they are mainly more expensive to house we get a lot of hardwood worktop which we turn into chopping board, bowls etc.
We get asked by the local community to repair or replace items with family history. We repair clocks that have been rejected by the professorial clock makers. Many of these items would be scrapped and not passed on to family members and history lost.
We also do metal turning from any scrap material where it would be far too expensive for a replacement part.
Dez Williams from the group:
Sheds is where you can go and enjoy company with like minded people, many men find that because they can not get out or carry on their hobby they become lonely. Sheds is a good place to make new friends (the truth is their wife doesn't want them messing up the house !!) When men retire they don't always have a circle of friends/ organisations to turn to and become lonely.”
Tips for other Nottinghamshire groups and residents to help them reduce, reuse or recycle:
- We have all sorts of ideas for reusing and recycling, for example a plastic milk bottle carefully cut can becomes a useful store for screws, baked bean cans can be used for paints and afterwards are washed out and go in the recycling bin.
- At shows we take items that children can play/paint newspaper is a good source to keep the place clean. It's not easy to remember all the recycling we do because it becomes a habit not a chore. The more we recycle the more ideas we get it just kind of happens.
- The best recycling is the friendship and talks round the coffee table, someone may have a medical problem and they find out that one or more have the same or similar and can recycle our stories and have an open discussion with our embarrassment.
