Welcome to the Repair Shop,
where cherished family heirlooms are brought back to life...
This is the workshop of dreams.
..home to furniture restorer Jay Blades.
Nowadays, everybody spends a fortune on stuff
that once it's broken, they just bin it.
But everybody has something that means too much to be thrown away.
And that's where we come in.
Working alongside Jay
will be some of the country's leading craftspeople...
Every piece has its own story.
It's amazing to think that some of my work
becomes part of that story.
I've always played with things, I've always repaired things.
And I just love it.
There is a real pleasure in bringing people's pieces back to life again.
..each with their own unique set of skills.
Right tool for the right job.
They will resurrect,
revive... What a man!
..and rejuvenate treasured possessions
and irreplaceable pieces of family history...
Wow!
She's fantastic!
..bringing both the objects...
This is what I remember.
..and the memories that they hold...
Oh, wow!
..back to life.
Oh, my God!
In the Repair Shop today,
it's man versus metal as Dom joins forces
with one of Britain's last remaining master coopers.
I'm going to teach you how to do it the old-fashioned way. All right.
Hit it.
And master saddle maker Suzie works on an A-list antique.
Oh, it's fantastic.
Nice bit of history, and a famous maker and everything.
Oh, it's a complete honour. Absolute honour.
It's a sunny, lovely day. See, now, this...
This is the life, isn't it? No work.
I don't know about that... LAUGHTER
Oh, hello. How are you doing? Hello. I'm Jay.
So what have you got for us?
We have a watch. Steve, sounds like a job for you.
Yeah, come on in. In you come.
OK, thank you. Thank you very much.
Having seen The Repair Shop at home in the Netherlands,
Ron and his wife Toos have travelled over 300 miles
in search of horologist Steve's expertise.
This is the watch, and it was a watch of my grandfather
and my grandmother.
And this is what you would call the Albert chain. Yes.
And this is my grandmother. OK.
They were living in Indonesia before the war.
After the Japanese invaded Indonesia in the Second World War,
they were both arrested and sent to the prisoners of war camp.
Oh, right. Yeah.
My grandfather was taken to the Burma Railway to work there.
My grandmother was taken to a women's camp on Sumatra.
Right. Mm-hmm.
Fleeing from her house and being arrested,
the only thing she could take with her was this watch.
So she sewed it in her clothes,
and it stayed there as long as she was in the prisoner of war camp.
How long was she in the prisoner...how long was she...?
Four years. Four years.
She sewed that in... In her dress. Wow! Yeah.
I know items like this were traded as currency.
For food. Yes, exactly. Yeah.
And not only would she be hiding this from the guards,
but hiding it from the other interned people, as well. Yeah.
So this means a huge amount to you. Yeah.
There is no family history except the watch.
This is... That's the only photograph? This is it.
So after my grandmother passed away in 1964,
my father got it.
My father passed away five years ago.
So now it's... Now it's up to you. Yeah.
How well did you know your grandparents?
Well, I was five or six when my grandmother passed away.
So I know her as the lady in the chair with...smoking her cigarettes.
Have you ever seen it work? Has it ever...? No, no, no.
I've never seen it work because when I got it from my father,
it was in this state. right. The hands are missing,
the glass is missing. The case is slightly dented, isn't it?
Yeah. I'm looking at this and thinking,
I don't want to do it up too much. Mm-hmm.
It has to keep its provenance. Exactly. Yeah.
This always will stay in the family. Yeah.
We don't have children, but I have a nephew who is...
..who is crazy about family things. Right. So it will go to him.
Ron must now return to Holland,
taking the chain with his grandmother's picture with him
but leaving the treasured watch at the Repair Shop with Steve.
It's the only thing left from my grandmother,
and the time before 1945.
I went to England for this guy, so I'm sure he can fix it.
So I'm excited.
This is a really amazing watch, and it's even more amazing
considering the history that it's had.
The fact that it was sewn into a dress
for four years in a prisoner of war camp.
I think it's really surprising
that it's actually survived in this state.
A watch this size calls for some serious magnification.
It's got some dings in the case.
The mechanism is fairly...
..gunged up, actually.
It certainly needs a jolly good clean through.
Whenever you get that eye out, you know I'll want to have a go!
Can I have a look at what you're seeing? There you go.
Thank you.
Oh, wow.
So can you see why it's not working?
There is power getting through there.
So I think with just a good overhaul,
maybe some work to the escapement.
So will all of that, see this kind of dirt mark around there,
that will go, then, yeah? Some of it will.
Some of it? Not all of it. OK.
Because we want to leave some of the history. Yeah.
And have a little hand in the middle?
Yeah, straighten these hands up, put a seconds hand on.
It really gives me great satisfaction to actually
take a clock or a watch that's important to somebody... Yeah.
..and you're keeping it alive,
keeping it going for future generations.
Yeah. You've got to have a passion or a love to do this type of work.
It's absolutely a passion. You want to go the extra mile,
cos you...you do go the extra mile.
Assessment complete, Steve's made a decision.
This watch is too small and too precious
to work on in the Repair Shop barn,
so he's taking it off site for specialist cleaning.
I really need to strip it down to check and see what the problems are,
because these mechanisms are so fine that any dust
that's falling out of this old, thatched barn could affect it.
It really needs to be in that clean environment.
Next, a rusty antiquity which should feel right at home
in the rural setting of the Repair Shop.
Hiya.
Carolyn and Carl have travelled over 200 miles from Derbyshire,
bringing with them a much-loved object from their old family farm.
So what do we have here, then? Right.
This is my grandmother's butter churn,
which I inherited in about 2000,
and it was originally in my granny's old house
that I grew up in.
And inside is the original paddles,
and then also, the big handle.
My granny used to milk the cows in the morning
and then we used to come in, and I just remember
pouring the milk in here and then I would turn it
and we'd make butter.
I was fascinated by this and, you know, at five years old,
you can't really read what it says. You can't quite work it out, yeah.
But it is quite fascinating and it's just lovely. It's beautiful.
Does that say Champion Churn?
Used by the...
Can't really read. No. Could you read that?
Champion butter makers. Butter makers of...
England and Scotland.
Ah!
Granny and Mummy moved to the farm in about 19..39?
'38, '39? Just before the war. Wow.
Obviously in the war, we had to make our own butter. Yeah.
And they would probably have made it just for the family,
or just for the people on the farm, or just locals. I don't know.
When do you think she last used it?
Well, I remember using it, probably the late '60s, early '70s.
What would it mean to you to have this restored?
Oh, it would be amazing. It would be really, really amazing.
It would be like going back in time, for me.
What it would really do,
it would take me right back to me and my granny.
And, um...
I'm very like my granny.
And when I think about her, I get a bit upset, but...
We were very close and she taught me an awful lot in life,
and I just sort of would like to be a bit like her, really.
Don't want to state the obvious,
but what would you like us to do for you?
I would love you to get it working properly
and actually looking like it would have done when it was made.
I think my whole family would just really appreciate it, as well,
because I've got three children and it would be handed down to them.
It would always stay in the family. Teach them how to use it, too.
And I could teach them. Yeah. I think all the old ways are lost.
You know, none of us know how to make anything any more.
It's all done for us and we can buy it in the supermarket.
It would be great to just...
..an old-fashioned way of doing it would be great.
And I'm sure your granny would be really happy
to see that you're taking care of it and keeping it in... Yeah.
..keeping it on.
This means a lot Carolyn, to have this back in the family.
If I could pass it on to my children and give them the benefits
that I had from my grandparents and my parents,
then I think my life would be perfect.
What do you reckon?
I'm just quite concerned about these cracks going down the sides. Yeah.
And cracks in the bottom... On the bottom, as well.
All the wood is... Not very milkproof, is it?
Not waterproof at all, no.
See, it's missing a strap here, as well,
which is probably part of the reason why it's all started giving way.
It's only once Dom has stripped the butter churn of all its metalwork
that he can see the extent of the job ahead.
First thing we really need to do is see if it's got any leaks,
so I'm going to fill it up with some hot water and see...
..see what happens, basically.
Just slosh in the water around inside, just to try and...
Yeah, you can see, look. It's leaking like a sieve.
There's...all round the bottom, all these joints,
it's where the wood's dried up,
where it's not been used for 70 years,
it's been sitting just, you know...
The wood shrinks as it dries out, so we need to rehydrate it
by submerging it in water, and it should all swell up
and hopefully seal up a lot of the gaps.
To do that, we're going to put it in this big barrel,
fill that up with hot water and just leave it in there overnight.
Next to arrive at the Repair Shop,
Tom Pfister needs help with a well-travelled trunk.
Bring it over, we'll put it on the bench there.
On the table? Yeah.
This is one for Suzie.
Hello. I'm Tom.
Lovely to meet you, Tom. You, too.
Oh, this is fantastic.
The Repair Shop is becoming something of a family affair.
Master saddle maker Suzie is Steve's sister.
Oh, this is lovely. What do we have here?
My great-grandad's trunk. Really?
That's right.
The lettering on the side,
HFP, stands for what, exactly?
Oh, Henrico Frederico Pfister.
And what did he use it for?
Well, he used to travel a lot.
So, I mean, he went to India and all over the world.
Why was he travelling so much? He was an expert in grain.
And he went to India to advise...
..I think Calcutta government, or the Indian government, on cotton.
All sorts of stuff. I mean, he went to Greece, Italy, Spain...
So a well...well-travelled case... Yeah, I mean, all over the world.
He went everywhere. So that's why we see all these dings
and scratches and whatnot. Yeah.
And what make of case do we have?
It's a Louis Vuitton. Really? Yeah, yeah.
He was a wonderful case maker,
because people were beginning to travel a lot more
and so they started making cases for their specific type of travel.
Some of them would have ironing boards in them,
or chests of drawers in them. Absolutely phenomenal.
So each piece is fairly unique,
but it was commissioned for that particular person
and what their style of travel was.
And it ended with my...one of my two great-aunts.
She gave this to me.
I sort of found it in the pantry, buried under saucepans. Oh!
And did you know what it was, then?
Did you know...? Well, she did say, "Oh, Louis Vuitton!"
SUZIE LAUGHS Oh, right!
These locks are pretty special.
These are known as unpickable locks.
Oh, there's a challenge! Yeah!
Better not lose... There's a challenge!
And every one's slightly different.
You wouldn't happen to have...? I actually found it. Oh!
Look at that. Brilliant!
HINGE SQUEAKS
So we've got a spare handle, here? We have. It's...
Oh, it's broken off here. Yeah.
Do you have any idea how that happened?
I do know exactly how it happened. OK.
My oldest son gave it a tug.
We were moving house and he... OK.
And then he got shouted at. Oh! Oh!
THEY LAUGH
When you have an article like this,
and then you have the story of who it belonged to,
it's a wonderful way of reminding future generations of your family
who that person was. Yeah.
The story all revolves around this case, and it's a beautiful case.
It's been in the family for...
..well, over a century now.
So it means my son who ruined the handle can...
..he can pass it on to his kids.
It's a bit of history, isn't it? It is.
It was always a bit...nerve-racking,
thinking that, you know, as the years go by,
it's going to get into a worse and worse state
and be irreparable.
I feel excited to see how it's going to come out.
I mean, it's nice to see somebody who knows what they're doing
who can repair it for me.
This is a really nice piece, isn't it?
Oh, it's fantastic. Nice bit of history,
and famous maker and everything.
Oh, it's a complete honour. Absolute honour.
This actually looks thick leather.
Yeah, it is thick. It's about 3mm thick. Right.
But you couldn't just have a case made of 3mm,
of this size, to go through everything it has to go through.
It needs a frame, it needs a form. Right.
So it's mounted on to wood,
and these studs go into the wood, holding everything together.
And then the handle, I'll be able to renovate that.
We can re-use that. Oh, can you? Yeah.
You don't have to make a new one altogether? No.
But the keepers here, that hold the handle in,
they're going to have be remade.
Shall we get over to your bench and... Yeah.
..you can make a start? All right, that'd be fantastic.
Ready? Thanks.
Before Suzie can begin restoring the case,
it needs to be made safe to work on.
The hinge holding the lid on has completely collapsed,
so she needs to make a replacement using new leather.
This is the really nice way
to cut an equal strap all the way down,
instead of having to mark it with a ruler and then cut by hand.
The gauge is holding the leather in place whilst I'm cutting.
Got to do a straight edge.
Which is from...right, you lay your...
If I hold this up. Yeah. All right?
You want me to my side? I do, yeah.
OK. Yeah.
Once it's on, it's on.
And I'm now going to put some... Get some tacks.
When I nod my head, you hit it.
SHE LAUGHS
Don't make me laugh!
The pedigree of this vintage trunk has piqued Jay's interest.
So this is a Louis Vuitton case? Yeah. I haven't seen one of these.
They don't sell something like this any more, do they?
No, you don't find them every day. They're fairly rare.
So, this here... KNOCKS ON CASE
..that's wood, isn't it? Yeah, it is wood.
They would normally use pine or ash, something like that.
All of the studs have the maker's name on. I do like this a lot.
This is nice.
So what have you found out about him?
Well, I found out that he was quite a workhorse.
He started his life working around about 15 years of age,
when he left home at 13. Yeah.
And he walked for two years to Paris and he got a job.
You said he walked? He walked,
and ended up in Paris and got himself a job
as an apprentice box maker.
Went on to set up his own business
and ended up getting a commission from Napoleon's wife.
Oh! So that elevated his position. His status, then, yeah?
Yeah. He moved up the ranks. He certainly did.
OK. So if he was good enough to make a case for Napoleon's wife,
then everybody would want him. Absolutely.
They'd be like, "Hold on a minute..." Yeah.
That was his break. That was absolutely.
And then later, his son developed the Louis Vuitton logo,
and the brown with the gold LVs on it. Yeah, yeah.
That was his son, that developed that.
So you see cases with that on.
And in today's world, you'll see that, as well. Yeah.
So this is the original, though, isn't it? Yeah.
This is, like...this is done by Dad. Yeah.
This is a wonderful piece.
Back at his bench, Steve's resuming work on the pocket watch
that had spent four years hidden in a dress
in a World War II prisoner of war camp.
He's now ready to rebuild the watch and has called upon Cindy Welland,
a specialist dial restorer.
I'm just tracing all of the numerals.
So if anything disappears during the cleaning process,
I've then got a to-scale replica of it.
The most important thing is that we keep as much of it
as original as possible.
Conserving it, rather than restoring it.
Give this a gentle clean.
I'm going to use a diluted solvent,
and if we're lucky, this discoloration will come off
without causing too much damage to the numerals.
Just takes time and being very gentle.
I think we're going to be quite lucky.
The solvent is taking off the dirt and not taking off the ink
that the numerals are painted with.
They seem to be staying on quite well.
Clean-up mission accomplished.
As Steve begins the rebuild,
Cindy must painstakingly hand-paint the numerals
that measure mere microns across.
I've finished. Hey, fantastic!
I'm quite happy with it now.
The numerals stand out.
That is really, really good.
And the minute ring is just incredible!
It was tricky.
I think that is brilliant.
You can still see some of the discoloration, but... Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I think, because you haven't cleaned it all off and shone it up,
I think that actually, you know,
that's going to keep the integrity of the piece.
I think they're going to be so pleased with this.
I'm chuffed to bits with that. Good. So well done.
Over at the metal workshop, Dom has been joined by Alastair Simms
to help with a 160-year-old butter churn.
Hey, you must be Alastair. How are you, Dom?
Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, too. Thank you for coming down.
No problem. Come and have a look.
Alastair is one of Britain's last remaining master coopers,
skilled in the ancient trade of making casks, barrels
and other containers out of steamed wood, bound with metal,
a craft that has been around since the Roman times.
I think it looks really, really good, I think it looks watertight.
OK. So I think what the next thing to do is to make some hoops,
which are the bands that fit on here. Yes.
Cos obviously, you've got two missing. Yeah.
So we've got some hoop iron. We can make two new hoops to go on there.
So it's 49 inches.
Piece of hoop, and then... Do you want me to just cut that off?
Yeah? I've got a grinder.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I've got a grinder!
I'll just chop it off with a cutting disc, no?
No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
I'm going to teach you how to do it the old-fashioned way. All right.
What, with this? Yeah. Go on, then.
I'm standing back here!
See, that's less noisy than your grinder.
Yeah, that's impressive.
That's a big old hammer, my God.
There's three sizes of cooper's hammers.
Apprentice's is 3.5lb, then there's a 5.5lb standard...
This is more than that, no? 5.5.
That's the heaviest of 'em.
What we're going to do,
we can see where the hoops have been.
And then what we do, we'll mark it.
Piece of chalk.
And that's where the rivets are going to go.
What size drill bit do you need? Don't need a drill bit.
Just need the rivet and a hole in there, look.
Surely we need to drill a hole, first? No, no, no, no.
Put that on there, like that. OK.
Hold it like that. Oh, my word.
So now we know where that's going to go,
we can trim the end off.
I see, now, that's set. Yeah, sure.
So you've seen... With the chisel. You've seen it done once.
Hit it.
Next job, to line them up and make sure that they're perfectly square.
My God, that's great.
That looks strong, even with just one.
Yeah. There's one more, then.
No, go on. You're going to do it.
OK. Yeah.
How's that look? Better than your one? No?
Yeah, I'll let you off. It probably is!
LAUGHTER
Next, Alastair fits the hoop to the churn
and eases it down over the barrel with accurate strikes of the hammer.
It's been an education. I've learned so much from him,
having a go at the rivets, and just looking at his tools, and the...
Everything he's got is so specific
and he's, you know, it's...it's beautiful, working with him.
True, true craftsman. It's been really good fun.
That's great, it's almost down, isn't it?
Thank you very much. Thank you.
Pleasure working with you. You, too.
Steve's nearly finished putting the microscopic components
of the war watch mechanism back together.
I'm just putting the final, more delicate parts in.
Quite nervous about doing this, actually, because I find these jobs,
doing such small jobs, quite difficult.
I usually work on clocks, not watches.
So to do such an important watch...
..is quite pressurized.
With the workings rebuilt, all that's left is to see if it ticks.
Just going to pop a little bit of power on now,
and see how we get on.
And hopefully...
This is the sort of moment of truth.
If the mechanism doesn't whir back into life,
Steve will be back to square one.
Ah! That's good. Really pleased. Really, really pleased.
So that's really good, because actually, it means
that there wasn't anything drastic wrong with the watch,
and it was just dirt and grime that was holding it up.
I'm just going to pop the hands on now.
These hands just push on... friction type.
OK, we've got a slight problem,
is it's, um...stopped.
OK.
Well, that's a relief.
It was just the seconds hand touching the dial.
Thank goodness for that.
The seconds hand is actually attached to
a very fine part of the mechanism, and the slightest bit of friction
actually will stop the watch.
So it's very important that that doesn't touch the dial.
So very pleased that's all it was.
With the mechanism up and running,
Steve can begin to fit the delicate watch back into its casing.
The watch isn't the only project that's testing the Repair Shop team.
Suzie's trying to remove the studs that hold the torn handle
on to the antique Louis Vuitton trunk.
But they're proving a little stubborn.
Hi, are you having fun?
Well, I'm a little stumped.
Um... These upholstery studs
are engraved with Louis Vuitton,
so I want to be able to re-use them.
The problem is it's not wanting to pull out.
So I'm getting the feeling the pin goes through and is possibly
bent back in the wood. Oh, really? Oh, my word.
But I don't want to force anything.
So... if you can get some sort of claw or something
or something to close on to it,
and then you can twist it, maybe, and see whether it'll come out.
Obviously I don't want to damage any of the leather around it.
Do you want to use my little electric hand drill?
With a dental piece on it?
To... Oh! Yeah.
Yeah, if you've got something that will go in there.
Yeah, that'll soon whizz that off. That would be perfect.
Steve drills away the leather to try and uncover the stud posts,
so that Suzie can work out how to remove them.
Yeah, I think a little more here.
I really want to expose whatever is in there.
But to no avail.
It's really stuck, isn't it? Really, really, really.
If I pull it any more,
it's just going to destroy this.
Having had no luck prising the studs from the front,
Suzie's attacking from the other side.
In order to replace the handles on the outside,
they're held on with these studs that go all the way through the wood
and they're burred on the other side.
I have to drill out the back of the stud,
and in order to get to the back of these studs,
I've had to carefully take out all of the linen
that lines the case making sure that I don't damage that in the process
because I'll be putting that back.
So it's a case of me getting inside the case to drill the back out.
There we go.
I use my handy-dandy little magnet,
I'm just going to remove these filings
so you can see there is the original stud.
After I've drilled out the rivets from the back,
I have to release them from where they've lived
for the last hundred years.
I have two out already.
I have another eight to remove.
Just very gently get in behind it.
This has ended up taking a lot more work than I initially thought
but it's OK. You just keep peeling away,
remembering somebody made this case, so we can remake it.
And just taking my time.
You never want to rush it.
You don't feel the pressure of time.
Gently does it.
Perfect.
With the studs finally removed,
Suzie now has a clean surface to work with,
so she can start bringing the leather back to life.
This case has become very dry and biscuity.
It just literally wants to crumble away.
So I'm just using a glycerine saddle soap
which will actually seal the finish,
so there's no chance of anyone, when they rest their hand on it,
pulling away the top layer of the leather here.
And you can see, it's still... The dirt is just coming off.
Suzie's got hours of leather conditioning ahead of her,
if she's going to get this Victorian trunk looking its best again.
With the butter churn now watertight and bound by its hoops,
Dom can begin work on the metal parts of the churning mechanism.
They've been blasted, stripped, and now they're bare metal.
And now we're going on with the paint,
which is a super hard-wearing satin black finish.
Next, the lettering.
Whilst taking the butter churn apart,
there was evidence on all of these cast items with text
that they had remnants of yellow.
So I've matched the yellow to this enamel paint and I'm just
filling them back in.
This is really fiddly.
I heard there was some painting going on here.
You all right, Jay? How's it going?
Are you breathing there?
I'm kind of holding my breath.
THEY LAUGH
You've got a steady hand, I'll give you that. Thank you.
You're not shaking. Thank you, no.
You know why I'm here, you know I want to have a go.
I haven't finished this one yet.
It's got the biggest letters of all.
All right. What I'm going to do is go for the end first.
I always like working backwards.
Oh, wow!
That's good, it's good.
Breathe.
Can't hold your breath!
Don't shake.
Keep steady.
C... That C's not as good as your C.
It looks more like a G, now, don't it? Yeah.
Man! You know what, I was doing so well.
Got the Champion "Ghurn" now. Ghurn!
No, it's good, it's really good. Yeah? I'm impressed.
You know what, that's hard. It's really hard.
Thank you for your help. You're welcome, sir!
I've painted, polished, cleaned, replaced,
fixed the barrel
and it's now finally time to just bolt it all together.
It's been a very long process to get everything to this point
and I'm really looking forward to seeing it back in action.
It's been a challenging repair for clockmaker Steve,
working on the minute pocket watch,
which had seen turbulent times in a World War II prison camp.
Here's the time keeper. How we doing, Steve? Yeah, good, thanks.
Got all the mechanisms done.
It's ticking beautifully, look at that. Oh, yeah.
But you know what, I need to look through that.
You do. It's that way, innit? Oh, it's that way!
Oh, wow!
With the watch completed...
Oh, look at that!
..Steve's now got the important mission of hand-delivering
this valuable heirloom back to its owner.
So, I've actually got to get going.
Have a safe flight. Well done, Steve.
Ron's 82-year-old mother is too frail to travel.
So Steve has come all the way to the Netherlands.
I'm really looking forward to seeing their reaction to it
working well and looking so great.
And also just the thought that it's had the most amazing journey
and this is just another part of it.
I'm very excited at last to see the watch back.
Everybody will be excited to see it restored
in its original appearance.
This watch is the only item connecting Ron to his ancestors.
It survived the horrors of a prisoner of war camp,
kept hidden by Ron's grandmother sewn into her dress for four years.
But the rigours of its journey had left the watch broken and battered.
After surviving the war,
it should be in one piece again.
Eagerly anticipating the return of the watch
is Ron's mother Catarina, and his nephew Martin,
who'll eventually inherit the timepiece.
DOORBELL RINGS
Ron. Hey, hello, Steven! Nice to see you. Come in.
Thank you very much.
This is my family.
Hello! This is... This is a moment I've been looking forward to
because I know how much this watch means to you all.
I am very excited for this moment.
Oh, man, that looks great. Wow!
And the movement is working. That's great.
That's great. It's wonderful.
Thank you. Yeah, that's really wonderful. You did a great job.
Beautiful.
This has been the most wonderful job to work on
because I knew what this meant to you,
and I know what an amazing history
this watch has had.
Thank you. I can't thank you enough.
Bless you.
It looks great. Thank you.
Beautiful.
You did a beautiful job.
Thank you very much.
I'm very, very happy.
And I'm sure my late husband will like that too.
Thank you so much.
Reunite the watch and the chain with Grandmother.
Absolutely.
Fantastic. That looks great, that looks complete now.
It's complete, isn't it? That's the picture of your grandmother.
Yeah. It's the end of the road, isn't it?
It's...
It's his memory for his grandmother.
Yeah.
And my dad. It's home again.
Thank you very much. Yeah.
Thanks.
It was an emotional moment for me
because I loved my mother-in-law very, very much.
And I knew what a difficult time she had.
I think this watch is a symbol of courage.
And, for us, very important.
Back at the Repair Shop, Suzie's nearly finished work
on the designer case.
There's just one finishing touch,
something that all Louis Vuitton cases of the time would have had.
An overstrap that secures the trunk.
This is going to be the tab that goes through the buckle.
I just...nip off these corners,
then you point the end like this - helps to feed it through.
Suzie uses her arsenal
of specialist leather-work tools to trim...
Just put it on the edge there and run it gently along.
..edge and crease the strap,
before sewing the two pieces together.
This is my awl and these are just surface marks.
So the idea is to follow that angle
and push it straight through.
I'm using two needles.
Bring the needle through, go back,
one stitch,
before coming forward.
Put the needle on top of the thread.
And draw it up.
Finally, the challenge of making a new strap look like an antique.
The strap needs to be distressed
to blend with the age of the case,
and gravel is wonderful for creating all sorts of scratches
and indentations that will make it look like
it's had a bit of a life.
Yeah, it's coming up great. Liking that.
This trunk travelled the world in the Victorian era.
But those journeys had taken their toll.
It was up to Suzie to ensure it lasts another 100 years
so that owner Tom has a lasting legacy
of his great-grandfather, Enrico.
Hi, Tom! Hello!
It's good to see you again. Yeah, you too.
How we doing, mate, you all right? I'm all right, I'm good.
What did it look like when you brought it in here? It was trollied.
Bits were falling off of it.
It was a little tired. Yeah, it had seen better days.
Are you ready to see it? I certainly am.
Stand back.
Oh, wow!
Amazing job.
It didn't come in originally with its overstrap. No!
So I was able to make a new strap
and make it look like it had been round the world several times. Yeah.
And then you remember the handle that side which was broken?
Oh, God, yeah, well done!
And then the back...
Do you remember it was split all the way along here? Yeah...
So I made a leather hinge.
What would Enrico think of this now that he could see it
in its former glory? He'd be amazed, really.
I like to think he'd be pretty chuffed.
We're going to keep sort of family records in it.
Oh, that's a lovely idea.
Yeah, that's perfect.
Thank you ever so much. You're very, very welcome.
It was a pleasure and an honour to work on a lovely piece.
We'll take it out to Tom's car. Nice one, Tom.
Thank you. All right. Cheers, mate. We'll be round in a moment.
The trunk means a hell of a lot to me.
It's one of the few things I've got from my ancestors.
Looks great. Looks better than great.
Henry would be proud.
Enrico would be proud.
It's ready to go, let's do it. Let's take it over.
All the hard work is over on the butter churn renovation
and Dom is finally at the stage
where they can put it through its paces.
Is this watertight?
Fingers crossed. It should be.
Food historian Kathy Gilder has come to give Dom and Jay a hand
at good old-fashioned butter making.
Hello, Cathy. Hello! To me that looks like milk.
It's cream. It's cream?
So you would separate the cream,
which is the fatty bit at the top of the milk, from the milk.
Milk goes somewhere else to make other things.
Cream is going to be for your butter.
So how long does the process take?
Anything from ten, 20 minutes... Oh, cool.
..to two hours. Excuse me?
Of spinning this? Of spinning round, yeah.
What, two hours of spinning? Yeah.
Let's hope it's not leaking then, or we're going to have a big mess!
That is proper cream, innit?
It's nice and thick.
That's looking good.
No leaks.
And you can hear the slosh. Yeah.
When it starts to turn... Yeah?
..the slosh will diminish.
So you know that the fat is going to coagulate
and you'll get the fat solid, or the mass,
separating from the liquid, or the buttermilk.
It's all right, actually, there's no leaks. No!
Not yet.
Think that's enough? Well, we'll have a look. Can we have a look?
OK, so... Oh, wow!
That's butter. Look at that! We're nearly there,
you just need to agitate it some more on the inside.
Really quick, like that, yeah?
This is tough.
It's a good work-out, isn't it?
This is a proper work-out. Keep going.
You can see it changing now, can't you?
Even I can see it's changing, actually. Really?
Yeah, it is. Bet you're just saying that.
Keep it going.
Can you hear it? I can hear it.
Excellent! Look at that.
Oh, my...
There we are. Look at that!
That is proper butter. Yeah, it's hard. It's great.
Guys, you've got to taste this. This is... We've made butter!
You've been taking your time! He's ready with the bread!
Been looking forward to this.
Nice!
Well done. I've never had butter like that.
It tastes different. It does.
It's absolutely gorgeous.
This butter churn holds fond memories for Carolyn,
who was taught to make butter by her beloved grandmother
nearly 50 years ago.
It's not worth a lot to anybody out there in the big world,
but for me it's where memories, stories,
I can hand it down to my children
I can tell my children those stories.
I'm nervous for you, I know how much it means to you. It does, yeah.
Hello. How you doing, mate, you all right?
So what are you expecting to see?
I'm just expecting to go back in time
and seeing this amazing butter churn that I had when I was about five.
So it would be amazing, when I was this big!
So let's see what this young man's done for you. OK.
Oh, my God! Oh, wow. That's unbelievable.
SHE LAUGHS
Oh, my God!
That is absolutely fantastic.
That is not what I was expecting at all. That is unbelievable.
That is amazing!
DOM: All of this, remember, we couldn't read...
No, it was, you couldn't even make that out.
Thank you so much. You're welcome, you're welcome.
Thank you so much.
It's absolutely beautiful. You're welcome.
Don't want to cry, but oh, my God!
Is it as you remember?
It's better.
Oh, bless you. Well done, mate, well done. Just amazing.
I didn't even know what to expect.
But you couldn't read this, you couldn't read that,
you couldn't see this. The detail is incredible. It didn't even turn.
It actually works. We made some butter.
No, really, I'm not joking. Oh, you're joking!
Look, these are yours, if I remember rightly.
Oh, they are, yeah. That's yours as well. That's just how it was!
Fantastic. That is amazing!
So all in there is where that butter's come from.
Incredible. I can't believe that you've done this.
It is just far in excess of my expectations.
Granny will be so proud.
Yeah, she'd be looking down smiling to herself,
going, "Oh, she's got some work to do now."
It's nothing like I expected at all.
It's better, bigger, more...
Just overwhelming.
It's great to see what it would have looked like all those years ago.
It must be, what, 150, 160 years old? Yeah, easily.
And to see the butter!
Oh, my gosh, I can't believe that they made butter out of it.
Join us next time
as more items receive the Repair Shop treatment,
and a new lease of life. Wow!