Suzie Fletcher of The Repair Shop has admitted that the show’s producers “cut out quite a lot” and there are many behind-the-scenes moments that fans don’t get to see.
A leatherworker and saddler, Suzie is a familiar face from the popular BBC series where she helps audiences restore their most treasured items.
Today, at the age of 62, she gives an insight into the filming of the show.
She revealed: “They cut out quite a lot because I lose control quite often. I end up with tears running down my face. I get so easily carried away by other people’s emotions. But I don’t try to hide it anymore because that’s just who I am – I accept it.”
Speaking to The Sun’s TV Mag, Suzie also explained how seriously the stars of the show take the restoration of the items given to them. She explained: “We are given the challenge to repair the impossible but we never fail and will never succeed if we knock on wood.”
Suzie’s brother Steven is also contributing to the programme as a clock restorer. They will also be joined by many other familiar faces at the Court Barn in West Sussex, including carpenter Will Kirk.
In the latest episode, Suzie is tasked with repairing a valuable taxi badge for sisters Kelly and Dawn Langley that their late father John received when he passed “The Knowledge” – the test that all London taxi drivers must pass.
John worked as a taxi driver for 38 years before he died in 2011, and now his badge is expiring. Suzie confessed that they “love it when two family members come to the barn” because they “stimulate each other and all these beautiful stories come out of it.”
Suzie remembered the time when her father owned a carpentry business and realised the importance of objects with sentimental value.
She described in detail how she and her brother “were cleaning out the house after Mum and Dad died, and Steve and I came into Dad’s workshop and it was full of cobwebs, like Miss Havisham’s house in Dickens’ Great Expectations.”
Suzie revealed that “time had stood still” in the workshop and that “her father’s tools were lying on his workbench where he had last left them.”
She concluded, “It was very, very emotional. Now when I pick up one of his tools, I think of Dad.”
