11x31 - Nurse statue, garden spade & Indian scroll

[bunniefuu]

In the Repair Shop today...

- I'll get pumping, shall I?
- Please.

- ..the heat is on.

- It's scary, I'm not going to lie,
knowing how precious this spade is.

- Yeah, I'm nervous as well.

- And the risky business of water and
paper.

- If there's too much humidity in the
air,

some of the colours may run.

It's quite stressful, actually.

But, yeah, it should be all right.

- First, a story of atonement.

Neil Hope from Cornwall has an item of
great sentimental value

in need of ceramic expert Kirsten
Ramsay's delicate touch.

- Hello.
- Hello.
- That's a beautiful box.

What have you got in there for us?

- It's not bad, is it? Let me show
you.

So, in here...
- Oh.
- Yes.

- OK.

- Sadly, I've got quite a broken
statue of a nurse.

It's in quite a few pieces, I'm
afraid.
- Goodness.

Oh, Neil.
- I know. Hopefully, that's it.

- So, tell us about this, please.

- So, it was a retirement gift for my
mum, who was a nurse.

So, this was given to her by her work
colleagues on the ward.

- OK.
- She was a children's nurse for about


And obviously being a nurse holding a
child,

it's very poignant and very apt for
her.

- What's mum's name?
- Margaret.
- Margaret?
- Yeah.

She was passionate about looking after
children.

She was so passionate about nursing.

Near the end of her career, she'd be
getting updates

from children that she'd looked after
previously.
- No way.

- Really?
- Yeah, so she'd get letters from them
when they were grown up

and they have their own children.

- Yeah.
- It was always lovely to hear that.
It really was.

- They're very special people, I
think, paediatric nurses.

- Absolutely. Yes. She was a wonderful
woman. She really was.

- Yeah.
- She inspired me to become a nurse.

I'd always wanted to be a nurse, but I
took a different path.

I went into the military.

So, I served in the RAF for 13 years
as a medic,

finished that and I thought,

"Well, now's the time for something
different."
- Yeah.

- My wife and I moved down to Cornwall

and I had the opportunity to complete
my nurse training.

- Really?
- So I finished that last year and
here I am now,

a community nurse.
- Wow.
- That's amazing.

- Inspired by my mum. Yeah.

When I told her that I was going to be
coming into nursing,

you know, she grew about six inches!

- Yeah. I just stood up then. Yes. She
must have been super proud.

- Absolutely. And obviously just, you
know, the saddest part

is that Mum passed away last
February...
- Sorry to hear that.

- ..so she wasn't alive when I
finished my training.

But she's always with us.

- Yeah.
- We always know that.

She was a nurse, but she was a mother

and she was there for everybody, you
know?

And just seeing that statue as one
piece,

it epitomised everything about my mum.

- So, seeing it like this...
- It's heartbreaking.

I think the most ironic part is that
on the day of Mum's funeral,

her ward manager said to me, you know,
"Look after the statue.

"It's a sign of who she was and what
she did."

But we moved all her stuff from her
house down to ours in Cornwall.

- Yeah.

- When I picked it out of the box, it
went crunch.

I knew something had gone horribly,
horribly wrong,

and the whole world just kind of sank,
really.

- I'm sorry.
- You know?

She'd had that for 20 years and I was
entrusted with it

and within a month I'd done that.

So, obviously, anything you can do,
Kirsten,

to save me from being in trouble would
be brilliant.

- It clearly has huge significance,

so leave it with me and I'll do the
best I can.

- OK.
- Thank you for bringing it in.
- Thanks very much.
- You take care now.

- Bye-bye.
- Bye.

- I can absolutely understand

why this has huge sentimental value to
Neil.

The fact that this is made of
porcelain

means that it should go together
really nicely.

And when you put those two pieces
together,

you lose the lines, which is
brilliant.

I think what I'd like to do is just
give this a bit of a clean, really.

It's vital if these breakages are
going to disappear

for this to be really, really clean.

I have worked on a few of these before

and I happen to know this particular
piece is made by Nao,

which is part of the Lladro factory.

And this nurse has been designed by
Salvador Furio,

who was the designer that made quite a
lot of these pieces.

I think the only concern is if there
are pieces missing

and it's quite difficult to tell at
the moment.

So, for now, I'm just going to
continue cleaning these surfaces.

And it's very satisfying.

There's a lot of dirt coming off.

- Dirt is more favourable territory
for the next visitor.

Gardener Rik Sharp,

with a challenge to inspire metal
expert Dominic Chinea to dig deep.

- Hi, there. You OK?
- Yes. Good, thank you. You?
- Lovely to see you.

I'm Dom.
- Rik.
- Rik, nice to meet you.

That's beautiful. Look at that.

That's such a nice spade.
- Yeah, it's lovely.

- It looks like it's seen some things.
- It has indeed. Yes, yes.

Some good, some bad.
- So yes, I can see.

- Yes, unfortunately.
- Let's start with the good memories.

- I was given the spade by my
great-grandad, my dad's grandad.

He gave it to me through helping him
out with his garden.

- What was it like? Do you remember
it?

- It wasn't very big, but he just sort
of grew

what he needed in the garden to feed
himself with.

- Oh, so it was all fruit and veg.
- Yeah.
- Tomatoes in the greenhouse?

- Yeah. Lovely tomatoes. I've got
childhood fond memories

of that lovely tomato smell.

- That smell. Yes, the smell. I know
exactly what you mean.

- It brings back childhood memories.
- Yeah, there's nothing like it.

- No, no, it's great. And that's how I
got into gardening.

It brought out a love for gardening,

so therefore I then got an allotment.

And now I'm a head gardener.
- You're head gardener?
- Yeah.

- That's incredible. Just that little
spark from being a kid

in your great-grandad's garden.
- Yeah.

- So what was your great-grandfather's
name?
- Sydney Blake.

He was 100 when he died...

..and he gave me this spade.

- Do you mind explaining how it got
damaged?

- Well, I was digging a hole to plant
a hedge,

and I hit a rock in the soil and it
just sent this nasty crack

right up through the middle of the
spade.

And then when I told my dad,

he then told me that the spade was his
pride and joy.

- Your great-grandfather's...
- My great-grandfather's pride and
joy.

- Oh, no.
- Yes.

Gut-wrenching that you've damaged
something that he cared for.

- Yeah.

- And I then took it and got it
repaired,

and then I used it again and then it
just... It just snapped again.

And I had someone repair it, but...

- Oh, goodness, it's had two rounds of
being repaired?

- Yeah.
- So, third time lucky, then,
hopefully!

- Third time lucky, yes.

- So, that's the first one.
- Yeah. Went quite high.

- Yeah, it's all the way up here. I
can see it's almost at the edge.

Oh, goodness me.

Why are you so determined...

To get this repaired twice?
- I suppose...

Guilt, I suppose, from damaging it.

And I wanted to have it repaired
before my dad passed away.

Erm...

And it just happens that he died
sooner than what was expected.

- Oh, I'm sorry.

- And it just hasn't been to the
standard that I'd like it back to.

- Sure. If you can have anything you
want, what's the vision you've got

in your head of this hanging on your
wall in the shed?

- I'm not too worried about the sort
of pittedness.

I think it adds a bit of character to
it and shows its age.

But I'd just love for that crack to be
repaired.
- Yeah.

- It would mean the world.

My mind can rest that I've got it back
to its former glory.

- Yeah.
- The condition it used to be in.
- Yeah.

I think it's a beautiful thing. It
really is a lovely thing.

And I will do my very best for you.
- Marvellous. Great. Thanks very much.

Take care.
- Nice to see you.
- Bye-bye.
- See you soon.

I do love Rik's dedication to this
spade.

Having it repaired twice and having it
repaired, breaking it,

getting it repaired again and now
breaking it again.

You've got to admire the dedication.

I'm going to do my best to make sure

that Rik doesn't have to ever have
this repaired again.

It's a beautiful thing, all made of
steel.

The problem is, when you weld a piece
of metal like this

that's quite thin,

you're introducing an awful lot of
heat in a small area

and that heat-affected area becomes
brittle.

And that's why this weld has cracked
again.

And, obviously, two rounds of welding
has caused

all sorts of problem. That's why it's
all sort of distorted

and twisted. Basically, I've got soft
areas, hard, brittle areas,

welded areas. I need to heat this up
in the forge,

which will then relax everything and
make it all consistent.

Then I can do my welding and shaping
or whatever I need.

There's a lot of work.

It's not quite as straightforward as
it first looks.

- As Dom plots just how to aid the
spade,

things are rather more delicate over
on Kirsten's bench.

Having meticulously cleaned all the
broken pieces

of the 25-year-old porcelain nurse,
Kirsten is ready to rebuild her.

- I'm going to try and tape each bit
into place.

And once I've done that,

I can then start to introduce the
adhesive.

With something like this,

where I've got a porcelain and I've
got these very glassy edges,

they want to slide around

and it's quite difficult to get things
positioned.

They move.

So, it's a lot easier to do that
without adhesive on those edges

because that just adds to the slippery
nature of the pieces.

So, that's the first piece that's in.

I'm going to start taping this into
place.

I don't want too much tape because I
need to access that join.

It's a fiddly job.

This clearly has so much relevance for
Neil.

It's a tribute to his mother's career

and then also him now becoming a nurse

and having this in his home as a
celebration of that.

Right, that goes there.

So, just trying to work out what piece
goes where

and then hold it in place while it
slithers about.

I'm still keen to see whether there
are any significant losses here.

Until I get them all taped together,
I'm not really going to know.

At this stage, it is quite
nerve-racking.

I've managed to get all of those
pieces aligned now.

And the reason it was proving so
difficult

is that there were a few little areas
missing.

So, that made the movement quite
tricky to get everything in place.

I'm now ready to introduce the
adhesive

and bond the nurse back together.

I'm using a two part epoxy resin

and it's a conservation grade,

so it's got good non-yellowing

qualities and it's very slow curing.

So, it's going to have several days

to seep into those cracks

and make a really good bond.

Most of those joins

have pretty much disappeared,

which is what I was hoping for.

There's a few areas

where slithers have broken off

along the break edges and,

unfortunately, those were lost.

So, I've got a really obvious one

going down the side of her face.

So, I'm now going to make up

this missing area,

using a colour-fill technique.

I'm using the same adhesive

that I used to bond the nurse

and to make it

into a filling material,

I've bulked it

using an inert bulking material

called fumed silica.

And that gives you

the really nice translucency

that you need for porcelain.

I'm trying to go quite cautiously

with these colours.

If you make the colour too dark,

it's much more difficult

to try and bring it back.

That's pretty good.

I know she looks a bit messy

at the moment,

but once I've removed the excess,

I think that's probably

going to be OK.

I've also got this hair...

..to do.

I think this is the right colour

for the underneath colour

of the waves of the hair.

And then you've got in between

a slightly darker colour.

So I'll probably go over the top

once this is cured

with a slightly darker colour

to get those lovely tresses.

At this stage,

I'm just trying to get the filler

into those bond lines.

And once it starts to cure,

then I can tidy these up

and eventually sand back and polish.

- Angie?
- Yes.
- Do you have a sec?
- Sure.
- This one's for you.

- Ooh! Yay! That's exciting. Looking
forward to it.

- Paper conservator Angelina
Bakalarou's skills

will be put to the test,

helping preserve a fascinating memento
for Romita Hunt from Durham.

- Hello.
- Hello.
- Welcome to the barn.
- Thank you.
- I'm Dom.

- And I'm Angie.
- What have you brought in?

- Erm...

This is my mum's artwork.

She made this scroll

when she was doing her fine arts and
crafts diploma

at university in Shantiniketan, in the
eastern part of India.



- Oh, wow. So what is Shantiniketan?

- Shantiniketan was an institution

which was set up by Rabindranath
Tagore,

who was quite a well-known poet in
India.

For the turn of the century, it was
quite a futuristic thing.

And they had schools, they had the
university there,

which became known as Visva-Bharati,

which is the University of the World.

And in that university was where my
mum studied.

I heard stories from her about going
somewhere

to collect different earth and making
colours for the paint,

or using flowers to make colours.
- That's fantastic.

- They made the paper themselves. They
did everything themselves.

They learned everything, you know?
- That's beautiful.

- And at the end of the four years,

they had an exhibition of all their
works.

- I see.

- And I know that this was in the
exhibition for the passing out.

- This is such a beautiful thing.

- It was a storytelling scroll.

This tells the story of Vriksharopan.

That's one of the celebrations that
was started in the '20s,

which is planting of trees or
reforestation.

- So what was mum's name?
- My mum's name was Sangita Singh.

- Your mum was obviously a very
talented artist.

Did she carry on a career as an
artist?

- She got married, she had me and she
was a housewife.

And that's how she became, you know?

Because you got married and that side
of your life just disappeared.

She was just Mum.

She was cooking, cleaning, sending me
to school, getting me back.

- Are you proud of your mum?
- Very. Yeah.

But I never really realised the depth
of how much she knew,

how much she had learned, how much she
had done

until much later in life.

And she's not around now to ask her
further.

She had things of her art college and
her Shantiniketan days,

and what I found has been a revelation
to me.

- How did that feel, uncovering so
much of your mum's amazing history?

- Very bad that she never really got
to express that art

in her later life.

If she had carried on with her art,

I don't know where she would have
reached, but she never did.

She was Mum, she was my mother.
- She sort of dedicated her life...

- To just bringing us up, looking
after the family, you know?

And you look at these and you think,
you know,

there was so much potential here.

- What are you hoping Angie is able to
do to it, then?

- Getting it flatter.
- I can see that being rolled all
these years,

you have these...
- 70 years of rolling.
- Oh, my goodness.

- Insects have been at it because it's
been in a warm country.

- Yeah.
- And humid place.

- Yes.
- Yeah.

It's so great seeing it open fully
like this.

- It's beautiful. It really is.

Thank you so much for bringing this
in.

- I'm just pleased that my mother's
work is under your safe hands.

- Thank you.
- See you later.
- Thank you.
- Thank you.

- Bye-bye. Lovely to meet you.

So, I'd better roll this back up. This
is just fantastic.

I wish I could make something like
that.

There we go. She's ready.

- Good luck.
- Thank you so much, Dom.

I'm really impressed by this scroll.

This is just beautiful artwork.

But it is in a bit of a wonky, let's
say, state

because of all the years of it being
rolled

and obviously in a more hot
environment,

that kept the paper quite dry.

There is a textile here.

It looks to me like it's silk.

OK. I can see there's something wrong
here.

The backing has fallen off.

It looks like packing paper to me,

so it's not really providing

enough support for the silk.

However, my main focus right now

is to think what I want to do

with the main part of the art

that Romita is mostly worried about

to help flatten

all these big creases.

What I'm planning to do here

is a very light humidification,

which will help it relax.

I can't really spray water

directly on to the scroll.

By preparing these layers,

I will get sort of a vapour

slowly evaporating through

these layers on to this chamber,

seal it and leave it in to humidify.

I will, of course, be checking on it

all the time.

Right, so...

In we go.

I don't know what kind of material

Romita's mum used,

but it looks like

it's a watercolour.

If there's too much humidity

in the air,

some of the colours may run.

So, I will just have to cover it up

and then just come check on it

every five or ten minutes or so.

And then once I'm done,

I need to lay it down

and put it under weight

just to make sure that all the

moisture comes out of it and the

paper stays as flat as possible.

It's quite stressful, actually,

but, yeah, it should be all right.

- Back to work on the spade repair,

Dom has sought the red hot skills

of blacksmith Nick Wedlock.

- Unfortunately, it's been broken.

- Yeah.
- Welded up.

Broken again. Welded up again.

And then now the original weld

has cracked again.
- Yeah.

- And I need to re-weld that

and then shape it,

which I don't dare do

in this condition.

- No, no, it's just going to crack
again.

So, probably, if we want to stop that
cracking,

I'm probably going to have to
normalise it,

heat it up on the forge and just let
it cool down slowly.

- Am I right in thinking to normalise
it, we need to hold it

at a temperature?
- We do. We do.

And we want to get an even temperature
as well,

so this will be ideal.

If we put it on the top of the fire,

it will just give a nice, gentle, even
heat

and we'll just let it soak

and let the metal relax.

Let's put it on now.
- Nice one.

- Yeah.
- I'll get pumping, shall I?
- Yeah, please.

- Not too hot. We need to be

quite gentle, don't we?
- Yeah.

- It's quite scary, I'm not going to
lie,

knowing how precious this spade is.

- No, I agree with you.

- We're putting it on the fire like
that!
- Well, I'm nervous as well,

but it will be fine. We're going to be
gentle with it.

- I'm just going to wrap a wet rag
around the handle.

- Yeah, we don't want the heat
travelling up,

so that is a good idea.

That's good. That should do the job,
shouldn't it?
- Lovely job.

I think so.
- Yeah.

- I guess that just needs

to sit there now?
- It does, yeah.

We'll just keep a very close eye

on it because obviously being

so thin on the front edge...
- Yeah.

- We've got to be a bit cautious,

let's put it that way.

- Slow and steady. Slow and steady.
- Yeah, it's getting there.

- It's looking good, isn't it,
already?
- It is changing colour.

- I'll get the kettle on and leave
that with you.
- OK.
- Brilliant.

See you later, then.
- Appreciate it.
- Bye, then.

Huge thanks to Nick for his loan of
the forge.

I can actually work with the metal now

without risk of causing any more
damage.

The next step for me

is to weld this crack back up.

This TIG welder has got a tiny little
point

that I've ground to,

almost like a needle point.

It's very, very fine.

You'll be amazed how close a detail

you can actually be with that.

And this is basically a heat source

that will make this surface

of the actual spade molten.

The idea really is to just fuse

the two surfaces back together

where the crack is.

Each side will be molten

and I'll be sort of dragging it

back and forwards, basically joining

the two pieces back together again.

I will have, in my left hand,

some filler material.

So, if I need to,

once I've got that molten puddle,

I can actually add some

if I need to do that.

Oh, this is a lot more difficult

than I was expecting.

The metal has almost become crumbly.

I'll tell you what, that is tricky.

First go, basically as the metal
cools, it contracts,

and it pulled away from each other

and it started cracking again,

which is exactly what had happened

to the previous repair.

So, Plan B, I preheated it,

got it a lot hotter

and it seems to be holding.

I think we're going to get there.

It's looking good.

I'm actually really happy,

now, with the final shape.

The job I've got now is to try

and blend in the repaired section.

You can see the shiny area

where I've been grinding

and welding and hammering,

compared to the rest of the original
spade.

It's not going to be completely
invisible, but I'm going to do

my absolute best now with various
different grits of sandpaper

and grinding wheels to try and smooth
this out

and blend it in with the rest of the
spade.

- Kirsten's filled the missing
sections

on the porcelain nurse,

now almost ready

to be discharged from the barn.

- I now need to try and polish this up

to get this lovely, shiny,

glossy, glaze effect.

I'm using a very fine

polishing fabric.

It's called a Micro-Mesh.

And you get all different grades

and you can work your way up

through the grades

to get a really lovely,

smooth shine.

There's a real satisfaction

in being able to handle

something like this now,

that came in in pieces,

and now I can move it around,

it's sturdy.

And I know that this has

huge significance for Neil,

so I'm looking forward

to seeing his reaction.

And I hope that he'll be pleased

with the work that I've done.

- This graceful figurine

was a retirement gift

for a dedicated and beloved

paediatric nurse.

For Neil, it's the perfect tribute

to his mother and all she inspired.

- Hey.
- Hi, Kirsten.
- Hi, Neil.

Welcome back.
- Thank you very much.

- How have you been?
- I've been good, thank you. Yeah,
yeah.

Been excited.

- This held a lot of meaning for your
mum.
- Absolutely.

It just encapsulated all that she was.

- I can't wait to show you what I've
done.
- I know. I'm on edge.

- OK.

- Yeah.

There she is.

Wow.

How have you done that?

Are you sure you've just not gone out
and bought a new one?!

- I promise I haven't.
- That is outstanding.

It's phenomenal.

Absolutely phenomenal.

I'm going to have to put that down
before I drop it.

Thank you. Thank you so, so much.

I'm absolutely blown away.

I can go back to Mum's friend and say
I've looked after it now.

My conscience is clear now.
- Fantastic.

- I can't thank you enough, Kirsten.
- It's been an absolute pleasure.

- Thank you. Take care.
- All right. Bye-bye.
- Cheerio, now.

The statue was beyond what I could
have imagined.

You can't see the lines.

You can't see the repairs.

I just think of Mum now.

She was everything that that statue
is.

It's like Mum looking over us, keeping
an eye on me.

- So, moment of truth.

- Paper restorer Angie is hoping

her gentle humidification

of the Indian painting

has erased seven decades of creases.

- Right.

The paint has stayed put

and the scroll is now looking

much flatter and much more relaxed

than it was

when it first arrived with us.

So, I'm really, really pleased.

So, now that the scroll is as flat as
it can be,

I want to focus my attention

to this bit of the silk,

which has been damaged

in a few areas by insects,

but also it has weakened

over the years.

It's quite dry.

And my idea is to do a quick lining,

just to make sure that it has

that extra strength that it needs.

So, I'm using a piece of crepeline,

which is a very, very thin textile,

that has been coated with a heated
adhesive.

So, I can literally peel this off

and attach it on the silk

with some heat.

I've never used this before,

so I need to be very careful.

I'm often required to use new things

or to think outside of the box,

and I really enjoy that about my job.

Every item is unique,

so every treatment has to be

somewhat unique anyway.

I need a heated spatula.

So, I just want to get it to

a middle ground, where it's warm
enough

to reactivate the adhesive,

but not hot enough to damage my silk.

This seems to be doing its job.

So, I will just continue working my
way through this side

and then once I'm done, I'll just do
the other smaller bits

that are on the right side of the
scroll.

The lining is complete

and the silk is now much stronger.

The heat has also helped flatten it

as well and I am much more

comfortable picking it up.

So, this is really, really good.

Now this is nice and supported,

I get to attach

the older piece of paper back on.

This I have decided to keep

because it has the stamp of approval

for this piece

that went on that show that Romita's
mum did

on her last year of university.

I will be using a paste

that is wheat starch paste,

that's a little bit thinned out,

it's quite runny.

This should remain tacky

for a little bit,

but I do want to work quickly

because the paper, as it gets wet,

is going to start to c*ck and move.

Basically, it's when you see

that the paper goes wrinkly.

In paper conservation,

we don't particularly like or
appreciate for the paper.

Now that my first bit is done,

I want to just align the paper

right to the edge of the silk.

Make sure that it attaches itself

as flat as possible.

Right.

So, everything is nicely aligned.

So, I will just continue

working my way through the scroll,

bit by bit,

attaching the paper

back down to the silk.

And once this is done,

I get to address the little losses

that are on the painting.

- Dom is almost ready to dig for
victory

on his repair of the garden spade.

- I've got the actual blade part of
the spade

in a pretty good shape I'm happy with.

And I've turned my attention

to the main shaft and the handle,

which are all made of steel

and, sadly, had been covered in rust.

I'm using a rust-removing solution.

I wasn't expecting a miracle,

but, actually, you know what?

It's actually working really, really
well.

And all I'm left with here is this
lovely, nice, sort of grey,

dull grey, which is the steel.

And I hope that this repair

can take away a bit of that guilt

and Rik can now look at the spade,

and think back to the happy times.

I'm going to sit here and carry on

until every little speck of rust is
gone

and I'm left with that nice, clean,
grey steel.

And it'll be ready to give back to Rik

and get back in his shed, where it
belongs.

- This spade served generations of
keen gardeners,

but it suffered severe damage over the
years.

Its latest custodian, Rik,

is hoping Dom's managed to improve on
previous repairs

and return it to the trusty tool

his great-grandfather and father were
so proud of.

- Rik, hi. You OK?
- Yes, thank you. You?
- Yeah, very good.

This is kind of third time lucky now.
- Yes.

- It's had two previous repairs.
- Yes, it has. Yes.

Yeah, third time lucky.
- Do you want to have a look?

- I'd love to have a look, yes.

I can't wait. Yeah.
- OK.
- Yeah.

Oh, my God.

Wow.

Oh, that's fantastic.

Oh, my God. Can I?

I can't believe just how nice it's
come up.

It looks better than it ever has.

Absolutely fantastic.

You wouldn't know at all that it's
been damaged at all.

- There's a little hint of it there,

but it's...

Yeah, you've got to really look.

- Oh, wow. No, I can't believe it.

I cannot believe that it's in that
good a condition.

That's what I wanted done when I got
it fixed the first time.

- Oh.
- Would you say it's capable of doing
anything?

- Very light duties, I would say.

If you've got a nice, well turned over
allotment

or something like that, possibly.

But, being honest with you, it is
compromised.

We nearly lost that whole corner chunk
and it's back in one piece

and it's stable, but it's just so
thin.

- It's razor thin, isn't it?
- It's down nothing.

- At least now I can sort of hang it
up in the shed

and know that I've done my dad and my
grandad proud,

to actually get someone to fix it for
me.

- I'm glad. Hopefully we've taken away
some of the guilt of breaking it.

It must be quite a nice feeling now.
- Yes, it is. Knowing it is fixed.

- Yeah.
- Thank you so much. I can't thank you
enough.

- No, you're welcome. Well, get it
back in that shed where it belongs.

- Yeah.
- Perfect.
- Cheers. Thank you.

- Thank you.
- Thank you. Bye-bye.
- Bye-bye.

- I'm just so pleased.

I didn't think that it could look like
that again.

Yeah, it's got some really good
memories to it

and it reminds me of good times with
my great-grandfather and my dad.

- Approaching a happy ending to the
repair

of the 1950s' storytelling scroll,

Angie is making some final touches,

ready for its next chapter.

- I am preparing a bit of paste

with cellulose powder

to just fill in the small losses

that I have

on this side of the scroll.

It's in the middle of a very brown

and very distinct area

of the border,

so, I just want to distract the eye

from it. And once this is dry

and I'm happy that it's flat,

I will retouch it

with a similar colour

just to give it that seamless look.

These last finishing touches

are very exciting

because that means that

the scroll is almost ready

to be reunited back with Romita.

- The hand-painted scroll

was crafted by a budding artist

as a student

in an eminent Indian art school.

Romita has returned,

eager to display the restored artwork

and at last celebrate her mum's
talent.

- Hello.
- Hello.
- Welcome back.
- How are you doing?

- OK.
- OK?

- I am excited, but I'm a bit like,
"What's happening here?"

I want to see it.

- Because mum was a bit of an artist,
wasn't she?

- She was. I didn't appreciate it at
that point,

but now she's not there,

you sort of think more about it and...

Yeah.

- Shall we give you something to be
happy about, though?

- Definitely.
- Let's do this.

- Oh.

Wow.

I've never really seen it like this.

Never.

It gives you a better cohesive idea,

somehow, of what it is.
- Yeah.

- So, those creases,

they seem to have flattened out.

You definitely can't see

any of the holes.

Very nicely done. Great.

Absolutely wonderful. Thank you.

Really.
- It was a pleasure.

Your mum was a very, very talented
artist

and I really hope now that you have it
with you,

you're just going to feel

closer to her, as well.

- Definitely. This was something

she was really proud of.

And thanks to you,

it has been rejuvenated.

And I'm absolutely sure

my mum is approving...

..from somewhere.
- Definitely.

- Thanks a lot for doing this.
- You're very welcome.

- Thank you.
- You take care now.
- Bye, Romita.
- Bye-bye.

- It was very exciting

to see the whole thing.

My mum was very good as an artist,

so it's important

we preserve the scroll.

It's good proof

of what she had achieved

and I would like to display it

in my house, definitely.

- If you have a treasured possession
that's seen better days

and you think the team can help,
please get in touch at:

And join us in The Repair Shop.