Weaving the ABC…plastic yarns

If you are lucky you will have a cupboard full of lovely plastic bags from your purchases. At times I’ve had several very nice thick plastic bags from shops in good colours. It never feels right to just throw them away but there is a limit to how many you can need, in their original form, over a given period of time.

Inspired by Hiroko Takeda and Sheila Odessey (Trashy to Trendy) I wanted to revive those plastics.

After cutting the bags into flat sheets, I cut 9cm strips in preparation for cutting the ‘yarn’ in the new Saori sakiori cutter

The cutter was perfect for cutting plastics as there was no resistance at all and a joined ball of plastic yarn was created instantly. I used a 5mm blade which made quite thin slices.

The plastic yarn wove up nicely, and I interspersed some very fine cotton tabby (plain weave) rows. The thickness of the plastic yarn and the beat pressure of the beater will influence the character of the resulting cloth. See here.

Now I’ll be looking behind counters in shops to see what type of bag they offer with purchases. Is it worth buying something that’s wrapped in a bag you can’t weave into a new life???