Plastic Yarn Mats For The Homeless

Cut off the plastic bag handles and the bottom of the bag.

Plastic yarn mats for the homeless. They take thousands of used plastic grocery bags and crochet them into mats for people experiencing homelessness to sleep on. It takes 700 plastic bags to make a 6 foot tall mat with two inch straps and carry handle. Parking lot gets turned into a safe haven for the homeless at night. Most of the yarn and bags she uses are donated from the community.

They were made of plarn a plastic type of yarn made from plastic grocery bags that are crocheted into warm mats for the voa to give to whoever needs them. It takes about 500 bags to make a two and a half feet by six foot mat. Straighten out each bag by pulling at the end and the handles so that it becomes as nice smooth and flat as the plastic bag in the picture. Rather than throwing them out you can reuse them by crocheting them into multi purpose mats known as plarn plastic yarn.

How to make plarn. In particular plarn can be used as sleeping mats for people without access to shelter. The goal is a 3 by 6 size plastic yarn mat. I used size 10 5 knitting needles with a gauge of 3 5 stitches per inch but i am a very loose knitter.

Knit or crochet a test gauge with. Plastic bags are brought into the library. One loop and plarn ball at a time they work together to make mats for the homeless. How to make plarn plastic bag yarn the first time i learned about plarn yarn created by cutting and tying together strips of plastic grocery bags was in 2005 when british designer erika knight was a guest on a tv show i used to host called knitty gritty she showed it made using a rainbow variety of bags an array of which i have yet to come across here in the states and knitted into a.

Come on let s make some mats how to crochet a plastic sleeping mat step 1. The mats are made of plarn or plastic yarn crafted out of bags that are sliced into pieces and looped into a long chain. To make the mats plastic bags are cut into 4 inch strips and looped together to make plarn or plastic yarn. It takes about 100 hours to make one mat.

The plastic serves as a great insulator and barrier to the cold ground. The plarn is then crocheted to make the mat. Knitters and crocheters will use their experience to test the gauge which will determine the number of plarn stitches necessary for a 3 by 6 mat. Start with about 10 plastic bags at a time.