Reclaiming yarn is an old practice; an old way of finding new to you yarn. Our grandmother’s and great-grandmothers would often frog (or deconstruct) sweaters to help save money and reclaim the yarn for a new use. I have been wanting to get out and search in the thrift shops, resale shops and goodwill for some lovely wool yarn in some out of style sweaters. It is too late into Spring to find wool sweaters in Oklahoma. IF people wear wool sweaters where you live then you stand a much better chance of finding wool to reclaim. Find the Goodwill or thrift store that has wealthier client donators for the better quality sweaters. So many sweaters these days are cut and sewn which doesn’t frog without a knot every row.
I did, however, find cotton sweaters with nice stripes and lovely yarn. I spent the evening taking apart (frogging) a cotton rag sweater with lovely red and white cotton yarn. It would look wonderful as a scarf or possibly as crochet edging on a baby blanket. I haven’t decided. I only have one sleeve left to unravel (frog) and then it will be washed and dried on the line outside. Taking it apart took a bit of patience and some tv filled evenings. Once I figured it out the unravelling went quickly.
I haven’t decided what to do with them. The orange is glorious and soft. I have about four sweaters left to unravel. I paid wonderful end of season prices for them as the tag shows and it was 1/2 off the lowest red price. It wasn’t hard to reclaim the yarn but the texture of the yarn is not quite what I wanted. I’m not sure why.
Pros and Cons of Reclaiming Yarn
Cons
- It can be odd colors, not all the time but if you wait too late.
- It can be frustrating at times to unravel it.
- It can dirty to work with, if the previous owner didn’t clean the sweater before donation, at the least just dusty from years of neglect.
- It can take longer than you want reclaiming it, washing it and letting it air dry before you use it.
- You can have yarns that are out of style.
Pros
- It keeps good quality yarn out of the landfill
- It recycles it and gives it a new life.
- it is an inexpensive way to get new yarn for low $
- You can get colors and textures not available to the general public
- It is sometimes a higher quality than what you can buy. I found that the reclaimed yarn had more interesting textures than what I could find in my neighborhood craft stores.
What to do
- Stick with wool yarn in good quality sweaters
- Read all the articles you can about reclaiming sweaters
- Stick with colors you love and yarns you are dying to use
It is now 2016. I would add that the orange yarn is difficult to crochet as it is in strands and has very low twist to it. I am not sure if that is a result of the deconstruction process or just the way the yarn was spun. The red yarn has been fun to work with and is now being used as ties for my Etsy shop packages. I did use quite a bit in a couple of crocheted scarves. The blue made the most adorable, soft baby blanket. In retrospect, I would only reclaim the yarn of wool sweaters. The cotton can be more difficult to find a use for. Here are a photo of a cotton scarf created from the reclaimed yarn.
Here I was playing with the red and white cotton rag to see what it would make up as. I like the shell stitch I used here but the edges are a little wonky. I will frog this and start over.
Talk to you later,
Karen
If this is something that you are interested in doing…here is where I learned how to reclaim the yarn from old sweaters; http://chaoticcrafter.wordpress.com/2008/01/21/reclaiming-yarn-from-a-thrift-store-sweater/
