Month: August 2021

Farnham Repair Café update – SGF 11

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 14:31 — 13.3MB)

Farnham Repair Café update – episode 11

Farnham Repair Café update is a podcast made as part of the Surrey’s Greener Future initiative.

Surrey County Council asked people to submit ideas to help combat the climate crisis in September 2019 . They selected ten ideas from the submissions and Environmental podcasts is one of them.

The Repair Café Conference:

I last met Martin Charter in early March 2020 at the Repair Café Conference just before the first Covid 19 lockdown in the UK. You can listen to the podcast about the conference by clicking here. Martin tells me about the activities that have taken place in support of the conference because over 80 people attended.

Many might think that a pandemic would stop the enthusiasm. Not so!

Farnham Repair Café over the past year:

Martin tells us that there have been repairs. They considered a number of ways in keeping in touch with their customers. The have been using a ‘drop off’ model. This model has achieved a better success ratio than the traditional Repair Café concept. This is because, with the traditional ‘drop in’ concept the team has no idea what will arrive, whereas the items for ‘drop off’ are ‘triaged’ before being accepted.

The target for September:

Planning progresses for a return to ‘drop in’ from mid-September. The Repair Café is moving to a larger hall within the Spire Church in the centre of Farnham. This will enable the team to expand.

They’ve been recruiting new repairers and are willing to repair many things. There are restriction – no petrol or gas items – and there are restrictions around some electrical goods. Oh… another thing – you must be able to bring it in to the venue, by hand!

Take the opportunity to contribute to our greener future:

Bring your items for repair, extend their life! The Government has passed ‘right to repair’ legislation so repair is going to become more usual!

Listen to the podcast to find out more!

You can find out more about the Farnham Repair Café here. Their Facebook page is here.

The ‘Surrey’s Greener Future’ podcasts:

Please use any of the material in order to support your own initiatives to Combat Climate Change because each of us really can make a difference!

In addition to this web-page this podcast is available on Amazon Music, iTunes/Apple Podcasts, Castbox, Deezer, Podchaser, Spotify and Stitcher and others.

Like to comment on this podcast?

 

AKM Music has licensed Perfect Circle for use as the theme and for use as incidental music in this episode.

© The MrT Podcast Studio 2021

TH 19 20 T 25 Islamic Spain’s History through Art and Architecture

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 53:42 — 49.2MB)

Season 2019 / 2020 – Talk 25 – Islamic Spain’s History through Art and Architecture

Islamic Spain’s History through Art and Architecture is a talk by Alan Freedland. He splits his talk into 5 sections.

Alan uses many illustrations in the talk. Where copyright allows I use the original illustrations, however where the images are copyright I try to find substitutes. Where there are substitutes I have included those however, because I am unable find non copyright images in some cases, some are omitted.

Click a thumbnail below to view the image gallery.

Historic context:

In the first part of the talk Alan tells us about the historical context and looks at Islamic Toledo.

By the year 750 the Kingdom of Asturias, in Northern Spain, is the only part of Spain not under Islamic rule. Because of this the Christian campaign to retake Spain starts from here.

Islamic Emirate and Caliphate:

The second part of the talk is about the Islamic Emirate and Caliphate with reference to Cordoba.

In this period of Muslim rule Christian and Jewish citizens are important members of society because they bring different skills.

Muslim Art in the Christian cities:

Alan tells us about Seville in the third part of talk. We look at the Alcazar in great detail, we spend time looking at the different parts during the period between 1200 and 1390.

The end of Islamic rule:

We travel to Granada to learn about the end of Islamic rule in Spain and, above all, look at the importance of the Alhambra.

Post 1614:

Finally, in the years and centuries following the end of Islamic rule we learn about the Moorish Revival and how it affects Spanish Art and Architecture.

You can hear about all of this and much more by listening to the full podcast.

About this podcast:

This podcast is an edited recording of a talk first given to the Farnham u3a World History Group.

The Farnham u3a site is found here.

This podcast is also available through Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Castbox , Deezer, Podchaser, Spotify, Stitcher and Vurbl and others.

AKM Music has licensed Media Magazine for use as the theme music.

© The MrT Podcast Studio and Farnham u3a World History Group 2018 – 2021