So, I read about recycling yarn from high-end sweaters and knew that I had to try it. Mr. Tipsy and I are on a somewhat tight budget, and I have always been a thrift shop kind of gal. So the other day I was running errands on the other end of town and decided to stop at the big Salvation Army store out that way. It used to be a grocery store, so it has racks and racks of sweater-y goodness. I picked up about 6 sweaters for $2-3 each.
I’m not going to put all of the instructions for what I did here on my blog. There are so many talented women whose blogs I got directions from, and really, I have nothing to add to their great directions. So, I’m just going to link to the blogs that I followed and show you the pictures I achieved by following them. 
First things first, before you even buy a sweater to unravel, you need to know which ones will unravel well and which ones will not. I found a great site about that, and it explains what seams to look for and such. See it here at Neauveau Fiber Arts. (If you really love the sweater and it has bad seams, you could buy it and felt it (if it’s a feltable fiber) and make a purse or something out of it.)
So, now you’ve found sweaters with good seams. Some people with wash the sweaters at this point, but I just waited until the yarn was all apart. I figured I’d have to wash it to get the “kinks” out of the yarn from the knitting, and if you dye it you’re going to (almost) boil it, so it’ll be squeaky clean by the end of the process.
I decided to start with an XXL GAP sweater in an olive green color. I wasn’t in love with the color, but I hoped it would over-dye. The fiber content tag had been removed (grr…) but I did a burn test and determined it was (probably) mostly wool with a little bit of nylon elastic blended in. (for a great chart on how to determine fiber content by burning, check out the fiber burn chart at DitzyPrints.com.)
When I got ready to get down to the business of unraveling the sweater, I found My Virtual Sanity’s blog about recycling sweaters to be the most helpful. It’s VERY detailed and makes you feel like “you can do it”.
I wrapped the yarn as it unraveled around books.
I have since found a small wooden shelf that makes a 1 yd skein… much better. Here’s what I ended up with after using that:
The CDs are in the picture for size reference. I got a LOT of yarn out of this sweater!
Then I decided I wanted to dye this yarn, mostly because I can’t think of a single thing I want to make that would need this much olive green yarn! I went with the Kool-Aid dye method, because it was the cheapest alternative, and I already had the Kool-Aid here at home. I used the directions from two blogs for this: Eunny Knit’s for the self-striping technique and The Piper’s for the basic Kool-Aid dye technique.
My test hanks came out a bit more saturated than the final yarn, but I can’t pinpoint why (too many variables: microwave vs. stovetop, Mixade vs. Kool-Aid, pre-soaking vs. not, ratio of water:mix packets… It’s ok, I love the final results!)
Test Hanks:
Final skein drying:
Final skein with test hanks and one skein of the original:
Close-up of the final product:
I’m really pleased with the final results, and let me tell you that washing/(almost) boiling/dyeing sweater yarn really brings it back to life!!!
Tags: GAP sweater, Kool-Aid dyeing, recycling, unraveling, Yarn