I Dyed it My Way

A Handwoven Chenille Sweater

March 7, 2020March 9, 2020 Leave a comment

For quite a while now, I have had a few cones of chenille yarn sitting on my shelf, just waiting for my inspiration to transform them into something warm and wonderful. Earlier this winter I was working in my somewhat chilly basement studio and wished for a warm and attractive garment that I could wear while working and not have to change when I suddenly decide to dash out for a bite of dinner. I thought of the chenille yarn and pondered how to use it.

In my mind’s eye, I am still designing wearables with loom-shaped woven rectangles of fabric. I decided to make a pullover tunic top, or sweater, with primarily rectangular pieces that come straight off the loom, and zero to minimal tailoring. I sketched and planned and decided to use the 3-panel design I wove previously based on a Mexican huipil, although for this one I wanted sleeves and a cozy collar to keep cold drafts from blowing down my neck.

My design was simple enough: I needed approximately 6 yards of narrow 8-inch panels for the body and collar plus a bit extra for who knows what, and 1.5 yards of a wider panel for sleeves and who knows what. It’s always better to have a little too much finished fabric than too little. I decided to make the wider panel 12 inches wide. My chenille yarn is 2,000 yards per pound and I set it at 15 ends per inch so the finished fabric would have integrity and not slide and droop.

I chose the blue yarn, wound my warps and wove the narrow strip first. Six yards is a lot, but I just wove plain weave and it did not take long to complete. I wet-finished and line-dried the fabric, concluding with a final tumble in the dryer with no heat, just to soften it up. When I measured the cloth strip, my 6-yard length was there, but it was only 7 inches wide. I added another half-inch worth of warp to the wider strip and wove that at 12.5 inches wide. After finishing, I had 1.5 yards of 11-inch wide cloth. I decided to forge ahead with my design, resolving to shed a few extra pounds so the garment is not too tight a fit.

Nearing the end of the narrow 8-inch strip, with almost 6 yards wound on the cloth beam.

I cut the narrow strip into pieces: two 50-inch side front and back panels, one 19-inch center front panel and a 24-inch center back panel. I overlapped the edges slightly and used a decorative stitch to sew them together, but the fancy stitch is invisible in the deep fuzz of the chenille. I cut a 28-inch piece for a Mobius strip (one twist) collar and stitched it in place. That was a little too long for the opening, but I have to get it over my head, so I left a couple of inches to softly drape at the sides of the center front panel.

Assembling the panels: sides front and back, center front and center back.

Now for the sleeves. I cut two 21.5-inch long pieces from the wider cloth strip and attached them to the side panel edges so they would form a square when stitched along the bottom, but this left the sleeves too short and in need of a gusset where they attached to the body. Out of the remaining 11-inch square of the wider cloth, I cut two small 5.5-inch squares for underarm gussets. The remaining piece of narrow cloth was about 40+ inches. I cut that into two pieces to extend the sleeve length, and made an angled seam in the larger sleeve piece so that the sleeve extension fit the sleeve edge.

Hooray! The finished garment fits over my head and around my body and is the soft and warm sweater top I imagined. After cutting and piecing, the project used up all of my woven strips except for a few very small pieces. I’m planning to use the rest of my chenille yarn in a couple of similar projects, perhaps for next winter.

Winter Festival of Light

February 7, 2020February 10, 2020 Leave a comment

My holiday rigid heddle weaving project was a scarf woven of shiny rayon, sequins and lurex. I picked up the little hank of space-dyed sequin yarn at our guild’s Weftover sale in November. I wove the sparkly project in the darkest time of winter when we celebrate with various festivals of light, looking forward to the return of sunlight and longer days.

At first I thought I might be able to weave with the sequins in the warp, using a 7.5 dent heddle on my loom. The spaces are wide enough, I thought, to allow the sequins to pass through using only a very gentle pressure with the heddle. Nope! As soon as I tried that, the sequins started popping off.

I re-warped the loom with shiny rayon and sparkly lurex yarns set every half-inch, and decided to weave the sequin yarn in the weft every half inch, making a sort of sparkly grid set on a shiny red background. The space-dyed gold, green, turquoise and chocolate brown areas of the sequin yarn made random streaks of color as the red portions of weft matched the red warp yarns. In between my holiday obligations, I wove the scarf when time allowed and finished it some time in January.

Even as we have now passed the halfway point of winter (Groundhog Day), and the days are noticeably lengthening ever so slightly, Portland had its fifth annual Winter Light Festival this past weekend in early February. I visited the brilliantly lit installations along our downtown waterfront in between rain showers. What better event at which to shine with a bit of my own winter light?

Everyone, young and old, loved this interactive exhibit which played chords when you touched the light ropes.

Double Weave on a Rigid Heddle Loom, or Not

October 30, 2019October 31, 2019 Leave a comment

Weaving double weave, or two separate woven layers, on a rigid heddle loom has been studied, written about in books, and demonstrated extensively in online videos. It need not be very difficult, but it is more time-consuming than executing the same technique on a multi-harness floor loom.

My students have been asking for a class in using double heddles on the rigid heddle loom, which is something I do a lot, to create a double density sett in order to weave with finer yarn. They also want to learn to do double weave on the rigid heddle. This is not something I typically do, since I have floor looms for weaving complicated structures. But I figured I should make a double weave sampler so that I can instruct my students in this technique with some degree of competence. The basic technique requires two heddles and two pick up sticks.

For my sampler I used two 7.5 dent heddles for an overall sett of 15 ends per inch. I warped my rigid heddle loom by tying a red and a blue yarn together and drawing loops of the doubled yarn through the slots of one heddle. I threaded this heddle by moving one of the red yarns from each slot to an adjacent hole. I moved that heddle to the back heddle position, which would weave the red layer on the bottom. I put my second heddle in the front heddle position and threaded one blue yarn in a slot and one blue yarn in a hole of this heddle. The red threads pass through another slot; the next blue yarn goes in the same slot as the red threads, and then a blue yarn goes through the next hole. The blue layer (threaded on the front heddle) is woven on top of the red layer (back heddle).

The red threads in holes on the back heddle weave the lower layer.

Each layer requires two sheds: for the lower layer, one is made with the heddle in the down position; the other shed is made by a pick up stick under the back heddle/red slot threads. The upper layer sheds are made with the front heddle in the up position alternating with a pick up stick under the blue slot threads. The two sticks are positioned between different layers of warp, so they can both be shoved to the back of the loom when not in use, and they can move forward independently without interfering with each other.

The heddle sequence is 1) Red pick up stick, 2) back heddle in down position, 3) front heddle in up position, 4) Blue pick up stick. I followed the steps in The Weaver’s Idea Book, p. 203, by Jane Patrick, who surely gives clearer instructions than I am doing here.

My sampler has three sections. The first (lower) section is the two layers woven completely separately and open on both sides.

The next (middle) section is closed on one side and open on the other. One portion of this section is woven with two interlocking wefts, so the front and back are separate colors. Another portion is woven with one (red) weft. A piece woven like this could be opened out like a book, forming a double width fabric.

The final (top) section is closed on both sides and open at the top edge, so it forms a pocket.

The bottom portion of the sampler is open on both right and left sides, so the stick shuttle protrudes from both edges. The middle portion is open on the right side, closed on the left, so a side-opening pocket is formed and holds the bobbins. The top portion is closed on both sides and open at the top, forming a top-opening pocket, and holds a small ball of yarn. I folded over the top edge to form a space for a hanger, in this case, a chopstick. The strips of vertical red and blue stripes are areas where I wove all the layers together with a red weft.

Some time ago I wove a double-width wool and mohair blanket or throw on a 4-shaft floor loom. The width on the loom was 30 inches, so it opened to a 60 inch wide blanket. It was done in plain weave, with one layer woven on shafts 1 and 2; the other layer woven on shafts 3 and 4. All woven in solid black, no pick up sticks were required. It does not photograph well, so just imagine a large and cozy black rectangle. If I wanted to do future double weave projects, this is most likely the way I would go.

Another double weave project that I wove on a floor loom had designs created by picking up lower layer threads with a pick up stick, while 4 shafts wove the ground cloth. To create this on a rigid heddle loom would require at least 2 more pick up sticks: two to work the two layers of ground cloth and the other two to pick up the contrasting design. It was slow work on the floor loom and it should go without saying this would be a very slow process on the rigid heddle.

The double weave hand and turtle were woven (slowly) on a floor loom. While it would be possible to weave it on a rigid heddle loom, it would take a saintly amount of patience.

I realize I am fortunate to be able to choose the right tool for the job, and I believe the multi-harness loom is the better choice for double weave. But for the space- or budget-challenged, a rigid heddle loom can be a workable option. Take advantage of the many books and videos that will help you choose the right job for the tool you have, and keep on weaving!

Dyeing Yarn in a Ball

September 9, 2019 Leave a comment

I have been using a lot of fiber reactive dye on cellulose fibers this summer: tie-dye t-shirts, painting handwoven yardage, shibori samplers, etc. It’s getting cool and damp outside now, where I do my dyeing in summer, so I am wrapping up my projects and putting the dyes and resist tools away. I still have a bit of leftover dye stock and mixed colors in the refrigerator, but not enough to cover a large project. I hate to throw out dye while it is still viable, so I need some small projects to use it up.

To finish off the last of the dye before it goes bad, I loosely wind off balls of cotton, linen or rayon yarn, then put the balls in those plastic mesh bags that some fruit and veg are sold in (cherries, small tomatoes, etc.) The bag keeps the yarn from tangling excessively. I throw the yarn in a soda soak until it is saturated, squeeze out excess liquid, then put it in a clear plastic container (like grated cheese is sold in). I add the dregs of dye stock and water to cover it. I put the lid on and leave it 24 hours in a warmish place. Every so often during the first few hours, I swirl the container around to make sure the yarn is completely submerged and the dye liquid can penetrate to the center of the ball.

Winding a loose ball from a cone of cotton yarn.
Soda-soaked yarn ball secured in a mesh bag.
Yarn ball immersed in leftover dye and sealed in a plastic container.

The next day I rinse the yarn, starting with cool, then gradually warmer water. Finally I soap it in hot water and rinse again, all while it’s still in the mesh bag. The agitation from washing does unravel the yarn a bit, but not enough to tie itself in knots. I hang the bag on a clothesline to dry, usually over another night.

Winding the dyed, washed and dried yarn back into a ball.

When the yarn is dry, I wind it back into a ball and add it to my collection of colorful yarn remnants, which will eventually wind up in handwoven towels, placemats, scarves, etc. The coloration of the ball is not even, varying in intensity from lighter on the inside of the ball to darker outside. There are also little white, undyed areas where the yarn was touching itself while wound in the ball. Not only do I find this color variation NOT objectionable, I admire and value it. It is another source of delight in seeing unexpected color happen!

Tie-Dye in the Neighborhood

August 11, 2019August 13, 2019 Leave a comment

Some time ago, a young neighbor asked if I could make him a tie-dyed shirt with the classic spiral design. I thought a better idea would be to teach him to make his own.

On a recent pleasant summer afternoon, some neighbors came over for a little tie-dye party. They brought t-shirts and handkerchiefs; I mixed up a soda ash solution and fiber reactive dyes in 3 primary colors, plus black. I provided mixing containers and plastic squeeze bottles, and the kids went to town, squirting dye with abandon.

My young neighbor turned out to be a natural at tie-dye; his sister just wanted to do abstract art on her shirt.

Very successful first try at tie-dye
The abstract artist at work

The adults produced their own t-shirts of various designs, and after curing, rinsing, washing and drying, we had a show and tell and admired each other’s work.

First tie-dye t-shirt
A long t-shirt or sleep shirt for vivid dreams
A blue shirt overdyed with black, which reads gray. The 50% polyester fiber does not take the dye.

I have some other dyeing projects in the pipeline, but it might be a couple of weeks before I finish them. Meanwhile I thought I would post this quick story of how to perk up your mood with just a bit of color and messy fun.

Weaving 2/1 Twill on a Rigid Heddle Loom

June 16, 2019November 3, 2020 9 Comments

One of the things I love about my rigid heddle loom is its simplicity. Its primary strength is its ability to make beautiful plain-weave cloth rapidly and easily. Plain, or tabby weave, is when a weft yarn crosses over one warp yarn, under one warp yarn, across the width of the fabric, just as you would do to make a lattice pie crust. If you like to create visual interest in handwovens by varying the order of colors and textures of yarn, and complete a project in less than a day, you can hardly do better than to warp and weave on a rigid heddle loom.

I weave with double heddles for a double-density sett with finer yarns on my loom, but I still am weaving plain weave. Both heddles go up for one shed, both heddles go down for the other shed. But after producing dozens of plain-weave scarves, table runners, pillow covers, etc., the thought comes creeping: “What other structures might I be able to create on this loom?”

My library of weaving books and videos is full of advice on how to make a rigid heddle loom act like a 4-shaft loom, but the process always seems so complicated! Weave with 3 heddles, or use multiple pick-up sticks, or add heddle rods. If I want to do a complicated weave structure, I have floor looms for that. I want an alternate weave structure I can create with just the two heddles I already use.

After poking around on the internet, I found an answer: twill weave, but specifically 2/1 twill. The salient feature of twill is its pronounced diagonal lines created by small floats of yarn crossing over two or three yarns in the web. Having first learned to weave on floor looms with a number of shafts that are multiples of 4, I tend to think of twill as a balanced 2/2 twill or an uneven 3/1 – 1/3 twill. A 2/2 twill means a weft thread goes over two warp yarns, under two warp yarns, with each new row offset by one warp thread. A 2/2 twill looks the same on both sides of the fabric and the diagonal lines form a 45° angle.

Denim, used for blue jeans, is typically woven in a 3/1 twill, whereby a weft thread crosses over 3 warp threads, under one warp thread on one side of the fabric. The other side of the fabric is a 1/3 twill, with the weft crossing under 3 warp threads, over one warp thread. Denim is made with indigo-dyed warp and white weft, so the two sides of the fabric look different. The “right” side shows more indigo warp floats, the “wrong” side shows more white weft floats, and the diagonal lines frequently form a 30° angle.

Now, back to the 2/1 twill that can be woven on the rigid heddle loom with only two heddles and no pick-up sticks or heddle rods. With the help of my internet sources and some mental gymnastics performed during wakeful hours late at night, I realized I could thread the loom at 1.5 times the density of a single heddle in a 2/1 threading. One third of the warp threads go through the holes of one heddle, another third go through the holes of the second heddle, and the final third of warp threads go through the slots of both heddles. Any shed made with this threading is always 2 against one – plain weave is not possible with this threading.

This picture shows the three groups of warp threads. Top layer goes through holes in back heddle, slots in front heddle. Middle layer is threads in slots on both heddles. Lower layer is threads in slots on back heddle, holes in front heddle. Each shed is made by opening one layer away from the other two.

This 2/1 twill is woven in a 3-heddle sequence: 1) one heddle up, the other in neutral, 2) the second heddle up, the first in neutral, 3) both heddles down, making the loom act like a 3-shaft loom. This fabric is weft-dominant on one side and warp dominant on the other, just like the denim fabric, but with the diagonal lines forming a 60° angle.

The top portion is a section of warp-dominant twill, showing more gold warp floats. The bottom portion is a section of weft-dominant twill, showing more teal weft floats. Note the steep angle of diagonal lines.

I wove a scarf with the weft-dominant side facing up on the loom, warp-dominant side facing down for the whole length of the project. The two sides of the fabric appear quite different from each other. Next, I wove a scarf with alternating sections of weft-dominance and warp-dominance. To achieve the alternating pattern, I modified the 3-heddle sequence to 1) one heddle down, the other in neutral, 2) the second heddle down, the first in neutral, 3) both heddles up. I also reversed the sequence to get a zig-zag pattern of diagonal lines.

This scarf is weft-dominant on one side (left), warp dominant on the other (right).

The scarves pictured above were woven with a straight twill threading, i.e., 1-2-3-1-2-3. I wanted to see if I could thread the warp in a point twill: 1-2-3-2-1. The answer is Yes! I wove the scarf below with one 3-heddle sequence to achieve a pattern of diamonds on the weft-dominant side (blue) and another sequence at the opposite end of the scarf which created little elongated ovals on the warp-dominant side (red).

This scarf is woven with a point twill threading.

Point twill threading for two rigid heddles. The colors indicate how to thread groups of 3 threads, not a suggestion for colors in the warp.

The lesson learned is that the versatile rigid heddle loom can do more than one simple weave structure. Let’s hear it for twill!

A Paper Fabric Tote Bag

May 10, 2019May 11, 2019 Leave a comment

In my previous post on Shifu and Shibori, I posted a picture of a handwoven fabric whose texture reminded me of canvas – too stiff and coarse for clothing, but great for something utilitarian, like a bag. It turns out I have been in need of a carry bag for my rigid heddle loom for quite a while and the piece of shifu fabric had the perfect dimensions, 21 inches wide by 2.25 yards long, to create a bag for a loom sized like mine.

This fabric is woven with linen and cotton threads in the warp; the weft is paper plied with rayon. The hand of the fabric may resemble canvas, but the weave structure is not as tight and the fabric is not as strong as true canvas, so I decided to line the bag with some of my stash of old denim recovered from worn-out jeans. The denim lining will withstand the stress of the load of loom and tools the bag will hold, leaving the outer fabric to coast on its good looks alone. (Thanks to Judilee Fitzhugh for sparking that idea!)

I cut a large rectangle for the bag, two for the side panels, two for exterior pockets and two long strips for handles. I pieced the denim scraps together and cut that into rectangles of similar size. I added interior pockets for small tools, including two long, skinny pockets for stick shuttles or pick-up sticks. I used a jeans foot on my sewing machine to ride over the thick layers of fabric and lining, and used up two of my largest size machine needles in the process.

The used denim lining of the bag, with interior pockets.

The bag comfortably holds my folded loom and a variety of accessories.

Packed up and ready for class or workshop!

Shifu and Shibori

April 14, 2019May 5, 2019 Leave a comment

Several years ago I joined with a few other local weaving guild members in ordering some washi, or paper, yarns from Japan. My order included 3 yarns: a very thin all-paper yarn made from twisting and spinning a 2 mm wide strip of paper, a thicker yarn made from plies of paper and rayon, and a flat, ribbon-like strip of 2 mm wide paper wrapped with criss-crossing cotton and rayon threads. The goal was to weave shifu, or fabric woven from paper yarn.

Top: the fine paper yarn; left: the flat paper yarn wrapped with rayon and cotton threads; right: the medium weight paper and rayon blend.
Closeup of flat paper yarn wrapped with rayon and cotton threads, which performed well as warp.

While twisting and spinning the paper yarn does make it stronger, it is not usually recommended for use as warp yarn, because it will not often stand up to tension on the loom. Shifu is frequently woven from cotton or other fibers in the warp and paper yarn in the weft only. I used my paper yarns primarily as weft in a variety of projects: a couple of scarves with Tencel and cotton warp, one length of fabric with cotton and linen warp, and one with an overtwisted rayon in the warp to get a crepe effect.

Scarf woven with cotton and Tencel warp, paper weft.
Fabric woven from linen and cotton warp, paper weft.
Two pieces of crepe fabric woven with overtwisted rayon warp and fine paper weft.

Later, on the advice of another weaver, I did try warping with the flat, ribbon yarn, which was a little stronger than the other two. To my surprise, it stood up to the tension of my Baby Wolf loom, so I was able to weave a fabric of approximately 95% paper.

I had enough of the flat yarn to put on a warp 3+ yards long by 24 inches wide. I wove alternating rows of the thick and thin paper yarns for weft, and got about 2.5 yards of this fabric before running out of the paper weft. I wove the remaining 24 inches or so with alternating thick and thin rayon yarns. I took the fabric off the loom and separated the two fabrics by cutting between rows of machine zig-zag stitching. Having already woven and washed some other paper yarn projects, I fearlessly wet-finished, line-dried and ironed my paper fabrics. They held up beautifully! Then I wanted to dye them in indigo using shibori methods.

Closeup of fabric woven from flat paper warp and alternating thicknesses of paper weft.

On a warm summer day, I got my indigo vat set up outdoors and did some folding and clamping for itajime shibori. I wet out the fabric bundles and dipped them in indigo numerous times for a dark shade and high contrast with the undyed portions. Then came the rinsing and soaping and more rinsing. Who would have thought that paper could withstand so much washing? Not me, but I was very happy to learn what a strong fabric paper can make. I dyed a few other shifu pieces as well that day, so now all my paper projects have indigo shibori patterns on them.

Now I am taking the next step: cutting and sewing the handwoven paper fabric into garments. I made the largest piece into a top using my favorite old Burda pattern (See my previous post New Work from Old Fabric). The fabric of linen and cotton warp with paper weft has a texture and hand very similar to canvas. This will probably be made into something utilitarian, such as a bag or table runner. I will have to ponder the other small pieces for inspiration.

Finished and dyed fabric from which the garment was fashioned.
Closeup of the canvas-like fabric with linen and cotton warp.
Small piece of fabric woven with flat paper warp and rayon weft. Very soft!

Learn more about the time- and labor-intensive craft of creating handmade paper yarn and shifu: Susan J. Byrd has written a book and posted online videos about making paper yarn. Hiroko Karuno also has authored a book and articles, as well as videos, on making paper thread and shifu.

Narrow-width Handwoven Fabric

February 16, 2019February 16, 2019 2 Comments

and the challenge of creating garments with it.

One important difference between commercially-made and handwoven fabric is the former is usually woven on mechanized looms at a width of 45 inches or more, and handwoven fabric is frequently made on a smaller scale loom and often woven at a much narrower width.

Using a formula to calculate how much yarn will be needed for a project, the weaver must figure out the sett, or how many ends (individual warp threads) there will be in each inch, multiply that by the number of inches of fabric width, then multiply by the warp length, usually in yards. That number is the total yardage of warp yarn required for a project. The required amount of weft yarn must be estimated similarly.

Many of us impulse-buy a given quantity of yarn and add it to our stash, uncertain of the exact project for which it will later be used. At some time in the future, the light bulb of a creative idea lights up overhead and we have to determine if we have enough yarn available to create our desired project. For example, perhaps we have just enough of THIS yarn available to warp a 25-inch wide fabric set at 12 ends per inch with a total warp length of 3.85 yards. And perhaps we have enough of THAT yarn to weave as weft, assuming 10-11 picks (woven rows) per inch, weaving a total of 112 inches, or 3.1 yards of woven fabric.

Figuring that we will lose about 27 inches of warp to the parts tied to the back and front beams of the loom, as well as draw-in, take-up and shrinkage, we will be lucky to produce a finished fabric that is 20-some inches wide and barely 3 yards long. After wet-finishing and ironing the fabric, if it becomes evident that it would be beautiful made up into a jacket or some other wearable item, we now must find a garment pattern with pieces small enough to lay out on the narrow and short fabric and still have enough to cover a body.

Such was the challenge I faced late last year with two narrow pieces of handwoven cloth. One fabric was woven with a slate-blue silk noil warp and a black wool weft. The finished fabric was about 24 inches wide, but just 3 yards long. I thought it would make a great jacket fabric, but it was going to be difficult to find a pattern that could be made up with such a small amount of cloth. Likewise, another handwoven I had made with an alpaca warp and a wool crepe weft (plied with a silver lurex strand, for a sparkling winter white effect). The crepe yarn wants to collapse; it is stretchy and it pulled in at the edges of the fabric as I wove. This finished fabric ended up only 20 inches wide, but about 4 yards long.

Fabric made with gray/blue silk noil warp and black wool weft.
Fabric made with alpaca warp and wool crepe weft.

I needed a jacket pattern that called for minimal hems and no overlapping facings. Fortunately I found a pattern for a zipper-closed puffy coat: McCall’s 7695. Rather than make the outer fabric puffy with batting, I purchased a quilted lining for the blue/gray fabric and a plain white lining for the alpaca/wool fabric, as well as separating zippers for the non-overlapping front closure. On the blue/gray fabric the pattern pieces extended selvedge to selvedge and I had to crowd them end to end. No extra fabric to spare! The jacket back pattern piece extended past the selvedge of the alpaca/wool fabric, so I had to cut just a portion of it, splicing in a piece down center back. Again, no fabric to spare!

The silk/wool jacket and its quilted lining.
The alpaca/wool crepe jacket and its smooth lining.
The alpaca/wool crepe jacket has a spliced-in center back panel.

This story does not fully convey my lengthy and nerve-wracking search for a jacket pattern solution, nor the late-night layout problem-solving that disturbed my sleep. But the story has a happy ending: I have two new lined jackets made from my own handwoven, albeit too-narrow, too-short cloth.

The finished silk/wool jacket is shorter than the white one because the fabric was a shorter overall length.
The slightly longer finished alpaca/wool crepe jacket.

Reuse, Recycle, Repeat

February 2, 2019February 16, 2019 3 Comments

Old blue jeans were recycled into a rug, then recycled again when the old rug wore out.

About 25 years ago, when I learned to weave, one of my first projects was a set of rag rugs made from strips of denim cut from worn-out blue jeans. The rugs were woven with colored cotton rug warp set at 8 ends per inch and the denim strips averaged approximately 1 inch wide. A header of cotton yarn was turned and hemmed at both ends of the rugs.

One rug was placed in a hallway; the other was positioned just inside the front door of my house, where for almost 25 years it received the dirt, mud and road grime from thousands of feet wiped on it before they entered the main room of the house. The hallway rug did not get quite as dirty as the door mat, but it was trodden on by just as many, or more feet, and eventually the warp threads frayed and broke. The denim strips frayed a little along the edges, but remained surprisingly intact as the warp threads deteriorated.

The first recycling: old, worn-out jeans cut into strips for weaving rag rugs.
After years of wear and tear, the warp threads fray and break, exposing the denim strips and creating a safety hazard.
Left: the frayed hallway rug. Right: the stained and dirty door mat.

The exposed cloth strips started to become a safety hazard, so I decided the rugs must be replaced, but it seemed so wasteful to throw out so much fabric that appeared to have a lot of life left in it. I decided to wash the rugs and recover as much of the denim as possible, then re-weave it into new rugs. I put the rugs in the washing machine and sent them through three full wash cycles with detergent and a dose of washing soda. The frayed edges of the denim strips held up well through the washing and I hung the heavy rugs outside to dry.

When I brought the rugs indoors, I cut off the cotton headers, opened them up and recovered the cotton yarn to use again. I pulled the now scrunched-up denim strips out of the warp yarn and wound them directly onto a large stick shuttle. While the denim in the door mat rug is certainly clean after all the washing, many of the strips are just too stained and dirty-looking to use again. Still, I was able to recover 75-80% of the strips to reuse. Meanwhile, I had warped my loom with a red linen-cotton blend yarn, again set at 8 ends per inch and 28 inches wide. I wove a 3-inch header of cotton yarn, then started weaving with the now twice-recycled denim strips.

Recovering denim strips from the old, washed rugs.
Recovering the cotton yarn from the old rug headers.
The second recycling: weaving the recovered denim strips into a new warp.

I wove one rug with recovered denim and another rug with strips freshly cut from old jeans. The twice-recycled rag rug doesn’t look as pristine as the once-recycled rug, but it will be a welcome addition on my concrete studio floor, where I hope it provides cushiony comfort under my feet for another 25 years.

Top: the new rag rug woven from freshly cut denim strips. Bottom: the new rug woven from recovered denim strips.
The twice-recycled rag rug.