Photographs of Upcycled / Recycled Wool Rugs

I decided to post some photos of some of the rugs I've made using recycled wool. Directions for making rugs from woven, suitweight wool can be found here: http://www.earthlovedesigns.blogspot.com/2010/03/how-to-make-upcycled-rugs-from-recycled.html

I'm in the process of writing a tutorial on making rugs from recycled sweaters. The process is slightly different.

The following rug was made using six inch squares cut from five thick, wool sweaters.

The next rug was made from men's wool suits. I found out that using this kind of woven wool is a little easier than making rugs from sweaters. And they're quite durable, too.

This is another sweater rug. I bonded the rug pieces to a piece of thick canvas before I sewed around all the edges of the wool squares. Then, I folded over the edges of the canvas, ironed and pinned it in place, and made a canvas binding for the rug.

 

This rug was made from a hand-woven, Irish wool coat. It was my daughter's idea to make a rug using just this wool; no contrasting fabric.

 

This wool rug was made from recycled wool coats and sweaters. That's a ukelele in the picture, not a big guitar. The rug was made using 6 inch squares. I bound this one using strips of the tweedy-looking, cream-colored coat. Love this rug. It'll soon be residing at my daughter's house.

 

This is another sweater rug. I loved the blues and browns together. It has found a home in my 17 year old son's room. It is quite durable (I wash it in cold water and then let it air dry), and very soft on bare feet.

 

This is a close-up of a rug that was made from woven wool, which I cut from men's and women's wool suits. I wish you could see the soft, natural color variations in the wool. So beautiful.

This is the first rug I ever made, while I was still figuring out the best way to make rugs from recycled wool.  It took me a long time. I have always liked those old Victorian Crazy Quilts, and I was trying to replicate one of those. I had grand plans for adding embroidery and buttons and all, but frankly I was just tired of working on it by the time I got it all sewn. I might try another Crazy Quilt rug using Heat Bond Light, which would end the problems caused by the fabric moving around while I tried to sew it. Even pinning didn't solve that problem - if you have any other ideas, I'd love to hear them!

Detailed instructions for making rugs from recycled / upcycled wool can be found here:

http://www.earthlovedesigns.blogspot.com/2010/03/how-to-make-upcycled-rugs-from-recycled.html I'm sharing these ideas with you because I believe in recycling, and I'd love for you to give this a try.

One more thing:  I've never tried making these rugs with anything other than wool, but I'm sure you could use denim or some other fabric, depending on how durable you need them to be. 

Wishing you all the best,

Elin Willow