Who We Are

Technically speaking, “we” has been mostly “me” since I founded the Project in 2017. The fact is, however, that my work advancing repair has always been in collaboration and solidarity with others — so sometimes I say “we”, and sometimes I say “me”, but it’s becoming “we” more and more all the time.

In 2024 a more robust infrastructure began falling into place — resources to expand the work and formalize the project. This should become a coherent well-oiled machine in 2025. Stay tuned.

- Vita

Vita Wells

Founder, The Culture of Repair Project

Born and raised in South Texas, hailing from a long line of fixers and doers
Multiple rounds of community service work in Mexico, Ecuador and the Barrio of San Antonio
Corporate finance, logistics systems and investment management
Williams College BA (history), Yale Divinity School MAR (social ethics and theology), Yale School of Management MPPM (finance)
Arts: museum and industrial arts school governance, textiles, artist (www.vitawells.net)
Camino de Compostela — walking the field of stars many thousands of km, many hundreds of flechas (I’m not so fond of Santiago)
Fixing and doing all the way through

Advisors

Generous souls who help think through repair in educational settings

Using architecture and design as a vehicle for social justice, works alongside youth ages 9-18 to co-design and build public architecture projects that transform communities.

Emily’s work seeks to change the authorship of our built environment and cultivate power in underestimated communities, specifically girls and gender-expansive youth, undocumented youth, and communities of color.

See this short video about Girls Garage.

Emily Pilloton-Lam

Girls Garage
Founder and Executive Director

Designer, builder, educator
Founder of Project H Design, its sister program, Girls Garage and earlier programs
Lecturer in the College of Environmental Design at UC Berkeley
Author of two books concerning design, individual empowerment and transformation
UC Berkeley BA, architecture
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, MFAs in Architecture, Interior Architecture, and Designed Objects

Repair x Reuse Washington is the home of Repair Economy: “Growing and strengthening Washington’s network of community repair events/activities, tool libraries, remakeries, repair shops, and reuse entities to build a cleaner, more resilient, more equitable, and more interconnected future.”

Kami Bruner

Repair x Reuse Washington
Chief Convener

Hailing from Nashville Tennessee
Community organizer in environmental and social issues from early on
Organizing, supporting, advocating and agitating around the circular economy, zero waste, and sustainability in New Orleans, Los Angeles and Seattle
Favorite work: systems thinking, organizational capacity-building, and serving as connective tissue between great people and great ideas
Favorite pastimes: scavenging, repurposing, and creative engineering.
University of the South (Sewanee) BA (religious studies)
Tulane University MS (sustainable organizational development and community disaster resilience)

Brooke is an interdisciplinary, research-based artist who combines studio and social practice and works in drawing, painting, printmaking, performance, and installation.

She and her work have been widely recognized through many exhibitions, grants, fellowships and residencies.

Brooke Toczylowski

Artist
Principal of Noisy River Consulting

Practicing Artist and principal of Noisy River Consulting, providing strategic support to non-profits, schools, and governmental institutions
Twenty-plus years in education and non-profits—as a teacher, curriculum coach, facilitator, and leader
Co-Founder and the former Executive Director of Agency by Design Oakland (California), which grew out of collaborative research with Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education
Led the collaboration among Agency by Design Oakland, Maker Ed, and the Culture of Repair Project in creating the Cultivating a Repair Mindset Toolkit and professional development program
Back to her New England roots in 2021, after sojourning in New York, Oakland, Venezuela and Guatemala
Williams College, BA (Studio Art and American Studies); Clark University, MFA; San Francisco State University (teaching credential)

Consultant to the Project

Kyle Cornforth

Served as Executive Director of Maker Ed, an organization committed to transforming education with project-based, culturally competent pedagogy.
Served as Managing Director of the Edible School Project, Berkeley, CA
Led policy reform for Berkeley Unified School District’s lunch program, advised on USDA policy for school food, and led professional development for teachers globally on how non-traditional education experiences are essential to truly prepare students for their lives on this planet.
Currently consults on strategy, organizational development, operations, and communications for multiple nonprofits.
Kyle has over two decades of nonprofit executive experience at the intersection of education, organizational development, social justice, and advocacy.

From Vita:

The Culture of Repair Project was born from feeling overwhelmed by the enormity of the damage we've done to the Earth, the ache made all the more acute by its seemingly inexorable acceleration. Immobilized by the scope of what's called for, I felt that if I could define a tight focus for my efforts, so that I could see the impact of my work, I would actually do something.

I did do something, and quickly found that repair is a global movement.

So here I am, working side-by-side with people both down the street and around the world.

I want to bring congenial and skillful spirits into the Project to expand its impact.
Bonus would be a familiarity with the field of repair and maintenance activism and scholarship.

If you’re interested, check out the Get Involved page.

Please contact me if you’d like to help out.