Upcycling t-shirts into yarn

Did you know that in the UK around 336,000 tonnes of our unwanted clothing gets thrown away every year? The good news is we have come up with simple upcycling projects to keep clothing in use, and out of the bin.

In a few simple steps t-shirts can be made into t-shirt yarn. You can also use the yarn in another project we created is t-shirt drawstring bags. This is a great way to upcycling old t-shirts and not let them just go to waste. With the t-shirt yarn, there are so many possibilities. You can plait, weave, crochet or knit them into dusters or facecloths.

Environmental Cost of Cotton T-shirts

Cotton is one of the most popular fabrics in the world. However, it also has a major impact on the environment. See this video and learn about the resources used in producing a cotton T-shirt. It also shows how to reduce your T-shirt’s carbon footprint.

Making T-shirt Yarn

This is how we make our t-shirt yarn to craft with. This video takes you through the steps.

For the Queens Jubilee, my children wanted something to wear to their school celebrations. So I decided to make some headbands and bracelets in red, white and blue by plaiting t-shirt. This is an easy activity to do with children and they love that they have made the bracelet themselves.

To make the yarn, collect together some old t-shirts.

Cut the t-shirts into strips. You can either do this with scissors or rotary cutter. Or you could the technique shown in the video above to make a continuous ball of yarn. This is done by cutting on the diagonal between each loop so becomes a spiral and a continuous yarn.

For the plaited bracelets, hair bands or key charms, cutting the t-shirt into loops like below is good too.  You can use a pair of scissors or a rotary cutter, ruler and mat.

After cutting the yarn, slightly stretch the yarn it rolls up into yarn.

Look at our t-shirt drawstring bags on how you can make t-shirts into drawstring bags. The drawstring can be the t-shirt yarn.

For another video on how to make a continuous strand and ball of yarn. Or if you don’t like the waste you can make yarn from the whole t-shirt. 

Making Plaited t-shirt bracelet

For the bracelets and headbands, I plaited the three colours together.

1. Start with a loop not (getting technical its the overhand loop knot) at the beginning.
2. Plait the yarn. A simple 3 strand plait was used below.
3. Finishing with a simple knot.
4. You can use this as a key chain charm or bag charm like this. Or to turn them into bracelet or headband, its another simple step. Thread the simple knot at the end, through the loop knot at the beginning. This will create the loop needed for the bracelet or headband.

Upcycling projects

We have other Upcycling Projects to inspire and please share your projects. We love hearing from our followers on what they have been inspired to create.