The Hamilton tool library officially opened its doors on King Street East today. For an average membership of 50 dollars a year, you can rent thousands of tools from the not-for-profit for no additional fee.

All of the tools that you can borrow from Hamilton tool library have been donated by members of the community.

And the collection is growing. It currently has 35-hundred tools, and another 85-hundred on the way. There are kitchen tools, gardening tools, building tools. But the library is still looking for more donations, specifically shop tools for wood working and metal working. They’re also a bit low on kitchen tools at this time. We spoke with the executive director about how the library works and how it benefits those in the community who can’t afford a membership.

Halden Sproule, Hamilton Tool Library: “It’s 50 dollars per year, and then you can come and you can borrow any tools that you want anytime, no charge. It’s as simple as that. For every membership we sell, we give one away for free to someone in the community through the partner organizations that we’re working with — so the YWCA, YMCA, City Kidz, Good Shepherd. So we can get memberships out to people who couldn’t otherwise afford them.”

There are already about 130 members. Toronto’s tool library has around 400 members and Hamilton is hoping to eventually top that.