Another tutorial to help in saving our Mother Earth by turning unwanted items into something useful. This is the T-shirt yarn ball I made out of an old T-shirt which I have been wearing for 10 years day-in day-out, wash-in wash-out. It finally broke down and tore at the collar and sleeves. Waste not, want not, I decided to recycle it.
The T-shirt yarn is perfect to crochet and knit into a basket, bag, rug, scarf, etc… I have finished making the T-Shirt yarn drawstring bag as shown below. Please click here to have a look and you can download the simple pattern I created.
Other than crochet project, you could use the T-Shirt Yarn to make purses, handbags, rag rug, stripy scarf, knit a rug, braid a rope, etc….
Sometimes, people will call T-Shirt Yarn as T-arn or Tarn, which is a short form word of the combination of T-shirt and Yarn.
T-Shirt Yarn
Recycle Tutorial
Tools & Materials:
1. T-shirts (those without side-seam)
2. A pair of sharp scissors
Place the T-shirt flat on the floor or working table.
We only need the bottom-halve portion of the T-shirt. Cut horizontally from sleeve to sleeve as shown above. Cut away the end border of the T-shirt too. This useful” portion must be plain and free from printing, embroidery and any joints or seams. Any motifs will be too hard for the T-shirt to turn into tubular yarn.
Fold the T-shirt from side to side, leaving an inch allowance as shown.
Cut into strips as shown, remember not to cut the 1-inch allowance. Leave it there as we are going to use this to form a continuous strip.
The width of the strip will determine the thickness of your yarn, but the minimum is 15mm, anything less than this, the process will fail. The width shown here is 15mm.
Finish cutting the T-shirt from top to bottom evenly.
Unfold the 1-inch allowance and it will look as shown below.
The red lines are the cutting lines to be explained below.
The next process is to make a slant cut from strip 1 to strip 2, strip 2 to strip 3 and so on in order to create a continuous strip for the whole T-shirt. Please refer above picture for the slant cut.
I purposely leave the first strip uncut until I have finished all. No catch, just my preference to show you better how the slanting looks like.
Now, I have a long strip of continuous T-shirt yarn waiting for the next process.
Next is to turn the strip into a tubular yarn. All you need to do is tug the strip as shown below. Remember I told you that the minimum width of the strip is 15mm? The secret is…. if you have anything narrower than this, it will break once you pull.
See, the strip will curl and form a tubular shape after the tug. This process will lengthen the yarn too, which is good, so you have more yarn to work on your project.
….tug…
….tug…
….tug…
The strip has now turned into tubular yarn, from Fettuccine to Spaghetti ***wink***. You can roll your yarn into a ball and it is ready for your next project.
HAPPY YARNING!!!
Excellent, easy-to-follow instructions! I got 25 meters of t-shirt yarn from one t-shirt, and I made the cuts 20 mm wide.
Oh boy, I just cut up a tank top for nothing. When it came to the tugging part rather than curl up, the edges just stretched and frayed. I’m guessing the knit of the fabric was too coarse? Or it works only on fabric that has some elastane in it. Ah well, I’ll try again with something else.
Anyway, the tutorial was really easy to follow, thank you!
Nope don’t use elastine, it falls apart, especially with the overlock stitching and trust me I made sure it was a couple of mm over 15. But it was therapeutic doing it and got some long pieces so not all fail. Thanks for the tutorial. The instructions were really good.
A mans large Tshirt will make about 30-36 yards cutting at 1″ intervals…
Thank you for the great tip I’m making mask now for the Corona Virus, as they now! suggest everybody wear one…. this type will work much better than elastic, making it more adjustable.
Hi Denise. Thanks! I’m doing the same. Do you find the 1″ intervals to make the right thickness for the mask cord as opposed to 15mm?
Hi! Thank you for making this video!
To clarify, when you cut the shirt, the last step of cutting slants means you wind up with one long piece instead of pieces from circumference? Not picking that detail up how to cut stants. Thanks!
For those of us that are not crafty, I don’t understand the slant cutting part. It seems like this will cut the strips off? are you cutting all the way through the slant?
I want to do this for use on face masks. Thank you!
I tried this and the seam of the tshirt makes a big bump in the yarn…I’m thinking after cutting the sleeves of the shirt off I didn’t fold my working t-shirt fabric correctly. Any tip you can offer i welcome!
I used XL t-shirts with a seam…since I’m making ties…I just smooth shirt flat on my cutting mat, cut strips 3/4″ to 1″ wide with rotary cutter…stretch the piece…holding the seam helps to cut the strip into two equal lengths…my strings are plenty long enough and don’t have to measure again…
Gail, that is a brilliant idea! It doesn’t matter if it has seams, since you are just making ties for masks, and not a continuous ball of yarn! This way, you can use any old t-shirt.
She said to find a shirt that does NOT have seams.
If you are just making short ties for masks, it does not matter if the t-shirt has seams or not!
You need to use a tee shirt that doesn’t have side seams for a perfect outcome.
My Mom born in 1912 showed me as a kid to rip under shirts (t-shirts) and stretch them and then braid together. Once that is done then take one braid and start going around & around tightly and hand stitching each individual round to the previous one until you have a rag rug that fits your needs. She called it the “circle of life” rug as during hard times it came in handy during the winter and for young babies not yet crawling. *A thought about seamed tees-couldn’t you miter the seam at a 45 degree, stitch and it would stretch and roll? Similar to how bias tape is made.
Sharon, what a wonderful story/memory, an extension of the “circle of life” your mother referred to. My mother did almost the same with rags. She tore strips of cloth about an inch wide. Then folding them like bias tape, she zig-zaged down the middle attaching the strips as she went. I would begin rolling the rags into a ball of “ragarn” from one end as she began crocheting her oval rug from the other end.
Would you mind if I quoted you in some writing projects I am working on?
Can you use an old jersey sheet to make this kind of yarn? how would you fold it and cut it?
I am a little confused, you say 15 mm for width of strips, but that is almost 6 inches. What am I missing? thank you
it is 15 mm not 15 cm. 15mm is roughly 0.6″.
That is a very helpful tutorial.
If you don’t mind, I am giving this link to the tutorial on my blog. If you wish otherwise please let me know.
Do I leave the sides uncut. It’s hard for me to tell in the picture
Please leave one side uncut when you are cutting the t-shirt in horizontal direction, that uncut side is reserved for the slant cut.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
The tutorial is so clear…! Thank you for take the time to explain so clearly. A big hug.
Thanks for a great tutorial! ^_________^
Thank you! I have so many old Shirts here, now I have something to do 😀
Thank you so much for sharing your pattern.
It’s a great reycle idea. I always feel sad that I can’t use old T-shirt for any diy prject cuz it’s stretched while the color’s still good.
A rotary cutter and a metal ruler are much easier on your hands than scissors. Lots quicker, also.
It sure is easier, I bought a rotary cutter after I made this tutorial.
Thanks so much for the tutorial that makes sense! I have read about five tutorials about this but none of them made sense. Yours explains it perfectly!
this is very interesting.
This is great idea – wonderful structure, and useful.