Shrunken Sweater Backpack

Oh Noes! Your favorite knit sweater, shrunken by the forces of heat and water combined! Never you mind, as you can still wrap its loving arms around you with the cunning aid of RECYCLING!

Ok, so this tutorial describes how to turn a regular unshrunk wool sweater into a nifty backpack with some purposeful alterations, but the same principle can be used to reappropriate your tiny knits.

You're going to need:

• An industrial zipper. You can pick these up in some fabric supply stores, you might also consider going to a car upholstery shop (as I did) and finding out where they get their zippers.
• A 100% wool sweater. I found two for three bucks each at the local Salvation Army.
• A washing machine. You're going to need to tumble this in the washing machine on hot, with a little dish detergent added to get it to felt. Some tutorials I've read recommended putting it inside of a pillow case to prevent fuzz from clogging up your washer.
• A sewing machine with thread to match or accent your sweater.

Step 1: Sew up the ends.

To begin, I sewed up the neck and bottom of the sweater while it was inside out, then I inverted it through one of the sleeves. This left me with a nice clean seam on the top and bottom.

Comments

[anibioman]

this is awesome i gotta find a sweater

[ali208]

Cool I've seen tshirts turning to to bags but not a sweater... Oh and who doesn't love a guy that sews!

[porcupinemamma]

Love it!  "Mr.Fire Truck" isn't too shabby either ;0)

[joye68]

Nice job. I've never had to worry about my washer creating a permanent crease in my wool after a spin cycle. It may very well depend on the washer. (mine is NOT one of those newfangle HE ones). I usually boil my wools when I get a bunch of them of like colors together then pour them into the washer and add more Dawn. Then I let it run through. I do highly recommend that you stick them in a pillow case to catch the wool bits before you begin boiling them. I really like this one. It'll be good to work with my niece on this project who has moderate sewing experience.

[kimland]

pure genius!

[zoxx]

cute! and I'm not just talking about the backpack ^_

[Rob K]

Didn't know wool shrunk that much.

[LinuxH4x0r]

Cool My favorite word starts with f and ends with uck -firetruck what did you think I was going to say?

[!Andrew_Modder!]

lol thats .... cool xD. no rly this is neat, i like the idea!

[GorillazMiko]

Nice job! Look at you Mr. Firetruck, you're bad! Hahahaha, nice job! :-)