For November, our Local Recognition is for Chris Lee, perhaps best known for setting up the Royston Repair Cafe, a free service that runs every three months at Coombes Community Centre, Royston, where a willing team of fixers mend common household items, thus saving them from landfill.
The future of the planet, waste, and mending are all close to Chris’s heart. Working with the Household Waste Recycling Centre in Royston, he is spearheading a campaign to encourage residents to repair or donate unwanted items.
Chris coined the #RoystonReducingWaste hashtag before it was trendy. He’s full of good ideas and loves to chat about them at the People Planet Pint meet-ups in the Old Bull, set up by Tentshare’s Becka Heap.
Chris co-founded Royston Repair Café with friend Dermot Byrne (with whom he had previously set up Royston Freecycle) to help residents make do and mend instead of throwing away. Last year the Cafe celebrated its 10th anniversary. It is going from strength to strength, with almost every session booked out and a whole suite of repairers on hand. The next Repair Cafe is on Saturday 29th November
Chris sets out to make the town and the world better by doing things. He freely admits he does not like to organise others and sit in committees. Instead, he gets stuck in, gets his hands dirty, and gets on with it. He’s done so many small and larger things to improve the town, many of them invisible to the vast majority as he doesn’t blow his own trumpet. This is why he needs to be recognised here!
Many readers will have passed, and even used, the Mill Road Little Library – a free book swap – that Chris started in 2016. Find out more at www.facebook.com/MillRoadLittleLibrary
Sadly, its doors may be closed, but Chris was the person who named Royston Picture Palace after Royston First ran a competition to name the new community cinema back in 2012.
Even born locals will probably learn something about Royston if they read his series of columns on Hidden Royston for the Listing, exploring the underground, after dark, and behind closed doors sides of the town that has been Chris’s home for more than 30 years. You can still read the series online on The Listing website www.thelistingmagazine.co.uk/category/community-news/hiddenroyston
Chris very much enjoys running. In 2014 he worked hard to set up a parkrun in Royston though, after nine months, he had to settle for supporting Wimpole parkrun by marshalling there on 145 separate occasions to date. Many runners will be extremely grateful for this.
Chris has improved many aspects of Royston life. In his “spare” time he’s involved with Men’s Sheds – in Letchworth and nationally – that bring older men together to stay active, make friends, and drink lots of tea.
Chris always greets you with a cheery smile. For the full month of November, the smile includes one of his ever more elaborate moustaches in support of Movember – a worldwide campaign to raise awareness about men’s health. Chris’s 2025 top-lip creation will be on show when he sings with the Royston Choral Society at their next concert on 15th November.
Chris sums up his life as “trying to stay healthier and happier for longer by making, mending and learning”. I think he makes Royston a happier, healthier, and greener place.
