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Dropped by an old camera shop in downtown Portland last week
The place has been there since the 1950s and the owner was still using a leather bellows repair jig his dad made. He pulled out a box of brass screws that looked like they had been sitting there since the Nixon administration. Anyone else notice fewer shops stocking parts like that these days?
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clark.robin18d ago
Man that hits hard. It's not just camera shops either - I've been noticing this slow death of specialized repair places everywhere. We've got this whole "just buy a new one" mentality now and people don't realize the craftsmanship that goes into fixing old stuff. I was at a shoe repair place last month and the guy told me he can't find anyone to apprentice because everyone expects to make six figures on their first job. Meanwhile the owner had a last from the 1940s he still uses to shape leather. It's like we're losing all these little pockets of knowledge that took generations to build up. And for what? So we can throw away a perfectly good camera because a tiny screw is stripped? Makes me sad honestly.
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jenny_coleman17d ago
The thing nobody's talking about is how this connects to the housing market too. You can't find anyone to apprentice at a shoe repair shop because all those young people are either priced out of the area or working two jobs just to afford rent. My buddy in Brooklyn told me his local vacuum repair guy closed shop last year - couldn't find anyone willing to learn the trade for $18 an hour when they'd have to commute an hour each way. So we're not just losing the knowledge, we're losing the whole pipeline because the economics of living near these shops doesn't work anymore. It's like the system is designed to kill off anything that isn't mass produced and disposable.
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claire_walker17d ago
The shoe repair story really got me. It's such a waste letting all that knowledge just disappear because nobody wants to learn the trade anymore. Breaks my heart thinking about that last from the 1940s and what happens when that guy retires.
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