A ‘Library of Things’ opens in the Queen City

CINCINNATI (FOX19) - A new initiative to help the environment may help you save money and space in your tool shed or garage.

The 'Queen City Thingery' allows you to borrow things like rakes, shovels and even camping equipment. It’s all in an effort to help the environment and keep money in your pocket.

“Instead of people buying things they might just use once and sit in a garage, why not have them actually borrow our stuff?” Imago Executive Director Chris Clements said.

By “stuff,” Clements means garden tools, wheelbarrows, tents, tiki torches and much more. You can rent all of it for a small fee from Imago’s newest project, the Queen City Thingery.

“We also already had some of the things in place,” Clements explained. “Because we’re a nature preserve that requires a lot of tools to maintain, we already had a cache of tools that we were willing to let other people use. Because we have events on our land, we have tents and things like that.”

Clements says Imago has been around for 42 years. The environmental education non-profit encourages people of all ages to be more environmentally friendly. They do this through events and education on their nature preserve in East Price Hill.

The Queen City Thingery provides a cheap way to take care of their yards and gardens rather than buying these tools that you may only use every once in a while.

“People have been really enthusiastic!” Clements added. “People are hungry for ideas like this and they see this need especially now as people are spending more time outside, maybe they need a couple things to help them feel more comfortable outside.”

If you’re going camping and need a tent or a backpack, even a water bottle, you can rent that from Imago.

“We have tents for people to use, that’s often a difficult starting point if you don’t have your own tent,” Clements continued. “My favorite right now is the fact that we have these backpacks. These are fantastic if you’re interested in trying backpacking out.”

A good hiking pack can cost hundreds of dollars but a rental from the Queen City Thingery will be just $10-15 dollars.

When these items get returned, they are checked over for damage and sanitized before being used again.

Clements says even if these items aren’t something you need, come on out to Imago and enjoy their nature preserve for free!

They are located at 700 Enright Avenue, Cincinnati, OH 45205.

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