Project 2
Material Study: Recycling Linen
05-25-2023
As a designer, I feel a responsibility to work efficiently and economically without contributing to the ever growing mass of trash.
After working in linen for a few years, I noticed that excess fabric is deemed “waste” in each step of the making process. From the flax grower to the material processor to the weaver to the dyer to the distributer to the manufacturer and then to the consumer’s home, new waste was created. And in each previous step of the making process, that discard had been considered useable.
Learning about the process of turning flax into linen ignited curiosity - I wanted to explore reversing that process. Could I take discarded linen and turn it back into unyarned fibres?
With ad hoc tools, I experimented and developed a process to do just that.
TOOLS
a blender
water
straining tools
small scraps of linen cloth
mold forms
PROCESS
Place one cup of linen scraps into the blender. Add two cups of water. Blend, pausing often to untangle any yarns that may wind around the blades. Add more water as needed. Once the cloth begins to fall apart, pull it apart using you hands to prevent it from clumping. The material, now called “shoddy,” will be tenuous and chunky. Beware tangling.
The rest of this process is similar to wet felting.
Using a mold, press the shoddy firmly into the desired form, squeezing out water. A heat gun, blow drier, or dehydrator may be helpful to aid in drying.
Once dry, remove the recycled textile form from the mold.