Tuesday, February 24, 2009

What the Heck is Plarn?!?

Waste not, want not... 
Great words of wisdom we should heed in times of plenty as well as in times of  need. America has a long way to go before we can declare ourselves a truly "green" nation, but the movement is underway. Just consider plarn... it's yarn made from plastic grocery bags. The little suckers won't break down in landfills, so we need to do something with them. Why not knit them up into cute hats, bags, bracelets and other stuff. The Recycled Jeans Company gives plarn two thumbs up!

If you want to get knitting with plarn, you can make your own. There's a great tutorial at well as many patterns for using plarn at www.myrecycledbags.com. If you'd rather buy some ready-made plarn, there are several Etsy shops selling it, including yarndeb.etsy.com and jesspins.etsy.com

You may be asking yourself, "Stuff made from plastic grocery bags - how great can that be?" That's what I thought when I first heard about plarn. But I've got to tell you, you can make some pretty amazing things out of Target bags. 

I shopped around on Etsy and here are a few of my favorite finds:

1. The Cloudy Day Ruffle Plarn Cuff from The Green Sea Queen













2. Recycled Plastic Nesting Baskets from reVisionDesign







3. Remarkably Colorful Creation from Arnym










I've been having a wonderful time trying to guess where the bags came from. There are tons of other great items made from plarn on Etsy, so get on over there and check it out for yourself. Or better yet, make your own. But remember to take reusable shopping bags to the store with you whenever feasible. It's better to reduce than reuse. 

7 comments:

Lilacpop said...

I just bought some of this! It only has a part of one recycled bottle in a skein but it's still good. Soft too!
Janna-LilacPOP

Robin@creations-anew.com said...

Wow..I never heard of "plarn"...great post...
Robin
CreationsAnew Photography & Design

Unknown said...

wow! what an amazing and useful idea. There are some wonderful things made with it.

Liz said...

I've seen this before - as market totes! Isn't that a great idea? Take all those plastic bags you get from the store and make a tote bag! :) Are you going to make anything from plarn?

Anonymous said...

How cool! I've been experimenting with banana silk, soy, and bamboo yarns but this one takes the cake! Plarn? Definitely going to try that!
DebD
dunkdesigns.etsy.com

Jeyd said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jeyd said...

I just ran across this post and thought I'd comment back with a link to my etsy listing which combines recycled jeans and plarn at the same time. (Jeyd Creations)

I've been having a ball with this stuff. it's not nearly as hard to work with as I would have thought it would be.