The Kingsbridge & District Men’s Shed has been going since 2016.

Before that there was a temporary one in Kingsbridge library.

Trevor Lethbridge offered them the use of the current workshop at The Mounts.

Chairman Alan Kirk said: ‘‘We’re here to support the community and we’re happy to welcome anyone who wants to join us.

‘‘They can do whatever they want to do.

‘‘People don’t have to do carpentry they can do whatever they want.

‘‘They can come just for the community support.

‘‘Men often find it difficult to talk about some things but here people tell us everything.

‘‘We have a few carers who bring their people along with them and we give them small jobs to do and they go back really happy.’’

Kingsbridge is one of well over 600 around Britain and it is there to offer support.

People can talk about their problems and worries.

Some people who come bring with them a range of skills such as carpentry, electrical, painting and more.

Alan continued: ‘‘We’ve had young people with autism and we’ve helped them to come out of their shells.

‘‘There was one guy who wouldn’t talk at all, his dad brought him along, and we gave him some small jobs like making little key holders, he started talking to us and now he’s got a job in a local pub.’’

The projects are diverse for example hedgehog shelters, a bug house for a pub, bird feeders, they have converted pallets to planters and even built a Chitty Chitty Bang Bang for the Malborough Amateur Dramatics Kids Group!

Alan explained: ‘‘We get money for the jobs.

‘‘We don’t charge probably as much as businesses do but we’re not in competition with them.

‘‘We do things basically that businesses wouldn’t want to do.

‘‘We do the small jobs that people want doing but that it would be too expensive to get people in to do for them.’’

The jobs aren’t all small as John Scales explained: ‘‘We built a picket fence for Kingsbridge Community College and now they’ve asked for a similar fence for the main part of the school.

‘‘It was for a memorial garden for one of the teachers who had planted there.

‘‘They’d put down seeds and bulbs and wanted to stop anyone going across there as a shortcut.’’

Men’s Sheds are like garden sheds. The difference is that their activities are often solitary while Men’s Sheds are the opposite.

The group meets on Monday and Thursday afternoons between 2pm and 5pm.

They have ten members at the moment with up to eight working at any one time.

For more details visit: https://kingsbridgeshed.co.uk/