The Repair Shop

S07:E46 - Rickety Table, Clown Shoes, Victorian Diorama

Today in the Repair Shop, Jay Blades and the team bring three treasured family heirlooms, and the memories they hold, back to life. First to arrive at the barn is Heather McPherson, with her twelve-year-old grandson Jacob. They have brought their kitchen table that's on its last legs and they are hoping wood restorer Will Kirk can bring it back from the brink. Originally Heather's great grandmother's, the pine table with a folding top and gate legs, is extremely important to them both. Generations of their family have gathered round it for meals – it's been privy to many a discussion and been ever present through good times and bad. For Jacob, who lost his dad suddenly when he was just six years old, the table holds precious memories of playing with his dad at the table and eating family roasts dinners together. When he sits at it even now, he has the feeling that his dad is with him still. However, the tabletop is so warped and split that it's really no longer fit for purpose. Will goes to great lengths to mend the original pieces of pine, rather than find replacements, and deliver the table back to Jacob and Heather ready to host many, many more roast chicken family dinners.Next is a first for Master Cobbler Dean Westmoreland, when Grant Harvey and his mum Tracey deliver a pair of enormous clown shoes! They were once the possession of Grant's Great Uncle Bert, who worked in a car factory by day and by night toured the working men's clubs and children's parties as a clown. He delighted in making people laugh, in his red nose and very big shoes and did it for most of his adult life. Both Grant and Tracey loved him dearly and feel the flattened, faded and scuffed leather shoes should be restored to preserve this funny man's memory.Expert David Burville is excited to take receipt of a Victorian diorama carefully transported by its proud owners, Sue and John Cox. The three-dimensional model of a horse racing scene, complete with hundreds of little spectators and racehorses, is made entirely of cardboard and wood and encased in a display box. Although never confirmed, John believes it was made by his grandfather in the early 1900s and it was his father George's pride and joy. It resided in the flat above the family's butcher shop in Isleworth. Unfortunately, it was damaged over fifty years ago, and the culprit was a nine year old John, whilst doing a bit of target practise with metal turkey skewers! Many of the delicate structures were impaled and detached and it's continued to crumble over the decades. A repentant John would be very grateful if David would rescue it. It's a painstaking task to repair each figure and fully restore the diorama but if anyone can…. it's David Burville.