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Sorted clean t-shirts (these have been waiting for 5 yrs!) Instead of giving Don’s shirts to the thrift shop I decided they should be a bath mat for the kids. I included some of my shirts that I shouldn’t have been seen wearing outside the house. See the yellow in the foreground? I wore that for 23 yrs, painted in it, etc. as you can see. The darn thing wouldn’t wear out—too much polyester.
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Cutting...I cut off the sleeves and the hem at the bottom, folded shirt almost in half (to w/in 2” of the other side), got out my rotary cutter and cut across the body from the bottom up to the arm holes in 1.5” strips. Don’t cut all the way across.
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Can you see where I stopped cutting? That’s about 1.5” before the other side. There are 10 strips that will turn out to be 1 long strip!
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Here’s the uncut side of the shirt. I cut diagonally starting at my index finger, slanting over to the op-
posite slit on the left. I found I could get 15-20 yard strips this way. The jags in the fabric dis- appear. The black lines are where I cut.
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The next step was to stretch the strip.
I was curious to see how much length was gained by stretching—not as much as I expected! But see how nice and neat that reformed strip is? Because it curls to the front w/inside show- ing on the outside—no stains, paint, fading, etc! Nice new colors exposed. Look at those beautiful balls of “yarn”!!!
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This is a mock-up of my first rug, made of all the pieces cut across the chest and back of the shirts. I
guess I was saving those 20 yard pieces for last! These were 18” long +/- DO NOT stretch strips before sewing together! It was a bear to uncurl all those ends and sew diagonally to join them!! I showed up at Marshfield with a ball of “yarn” the size of a basketball, ready to weave! Of course, I had to cut it into smaller lengths to fit on the shuttle!
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It’s beginning to look like a unit! It took 1 day to weave the first rug. Then I spent the evening at home trying to figure out what to do with #2. I was hoping for wedge shapes traveling up the sides!!
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Almost, but not quite. I’m going to try again in the near future. And there’s my yellow t-shirt!!
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And what little was left of my warp turned into this. I liked this a lot. It was easiest to do: weave with long lengths of 1 color and beat in little scraps for sparkle. And NO curled strips to sew together!! Another future project!
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Weaver’s info:
6 epi of rug warp (8/4 cotton) in a 6 dent reed 27” wide in the reed Hems woven w/ double warp thread, wound on ski shuttle instead of bobbin Approx. 2# of shirts/rug |
