Wed., August 8, 2012 4:15pm (EDT)

Fixing A Broken World In Chicago, Ill.
By Erin Stevens
Updated: 9 months ago

Ally and Carla, co-founders of the Community Glue Workshop.
Ally and Carla, co-founders of the Community Glue Workshop.
This month we are collecting your stories about the good things Americans are doing to make their community a better place. Some of your contributions will become blog posts and the project will end with a story that weaves together submissions to make a story of Americans by Americans for Americans.

On Chicago's northside, Ally Brisbin and Carla Bruni recently got fed up with throwaway America and launched Community Glue Workshop an initiative to promote repairing, rather than replacing, worn-out toys, appliances and other possessions.

Carla's background is in historic preservation and Ally owns Kitchen Sink, a neighborhood coffee shop. Their project is the perfect marriage of two important themes that seem to be disappearing: handiwork know-how and neighborly bonds.

For now they host their monthly Fix-Up events at Ally's caf, but they hope in the future to offer skill-share workshops and longer-term projects at a permanent place of their own.

Erin Stevens practices anaplastology prosthetic restoration of facial anatomy when surgical reconstruction is not possible in Chicago. She listens to WBEZ.


Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.