recycling t-shirt: Yarn

Since I moved to Taiwan, I have to admit that my awareness of reduce, reuse and recycle has greatly increased. I believe, the habit of the Taiwanese society, along with the encouragement from the government had supported the development of the care towards the mother nature.

One of the great advantage of staying in a dorm that is occupied by rich Taiwanese student (I'm not rich. I chose this dorm because the school encourage me too, and I'm too busy to find a cheaper place to stay), is that they like to discard clothes. Some of my PJs are second hand from those discarded clothes. I even found a contoured/ergonomic pillow, carpet, hot water jar, etc. for my room. Well, most of the discarded - yet still usable - stuff is t-shirt.

I've been wanting to do this since a long time ago, but I can't do it with my tees, even the one that I already owned since 1997. I am dreaming to cut and recycle the tees into a usable yarn.

A week ago, I found the victim in a carton box in front of the elevator. So whoever has this shirt before, be happy, it will be useful for quite a long time.

First, I cut the part that I want to transform into yarn

Second, I cut that part into small vertical cuts and the width was approximately 1.5 cm (or about half inch), but left one end uncut for about 2.5 cm (one inch).

Third, I cut the last strand of the vertical cuts, and the cut should be diagonal.

Fourth, continue the diagonal cut to all the next vertical cuts until all the cuts are done.

Fifth, pull the t-shirt strip. since mine is a bit fragile, I did it by holding the connection seams between front and back part of the original t-shirt, so that the seams would not be destroyed. Stretch the strips until the sides of the strips curled (usually inward).

And the yarn is ready for use.

I'm thinking about making a mop by crocheting the yarn. Whaddayathink?