Sweater Deconstruction

In the last post I mentioned recycled sweater yarn into hanks. Here are some pics of the various stages. I more or less followed Ashley Martineau's very helpful tutorial.

Started with a very nice sweater that didn't fit well. 1) took the seams apart--tricky the first time! 2) unraveled the yarn into balls. 3) wound them into hanks and tied them, like funny christmas wreaths--slightly wrong, since I was supposed to tie the ties like figure 8's to minimize tangling.


Then I soaked them in mildly warm water with a small squirt of my regular shampoo, gently squeezed (but did not wring) out the excess water, rolled them in towels, and then hung them to dry over a vent in the bathroom. Wound them back into balls, luckily no tangles.

Voila! After about two evenings' worth of work, 1000-1200 yards of sport weight, high quality, 97% wool/3% elastic yarn. Soft, squishy, beautiful.


My apartment doesn't get a lot of light, so the pics are always a little off. But my friend Sheila loves this color so I am going to crochet a keyhole scarf for her.

If I'd known I was going to get into this, I would have bought a yarn swift and ball winder instead of a sweater machine. Argh!