Every time I come home from a store with my purchase in a plastic bag it bums me out. Ack! How did I end up with another plastic bag…I hate them! There are just too many of them in the world and I am vowing to stop contributing to the demand.
Luckily, there are a lot of posts popping up around blog town on ways to reuse these nuisances to society. Whip up has a nice round up of posts on the topic of fusing plastic bags together to create a “new” material. I followed the etsy labs tutorial using an iron, some bags, and 2 sheets of paper to do these experiments:
I fused blue, orange, and white bags together. I cut them into flower and leaf shapes then fused them between layers of a clear bag. Cool! I love how the light looks coming through them. You can see the one on the right isn’t fully fused at the bottom. I think the bag I used was too heavy.
For this experiment I cut long wavy strips out of fused bags, layered them, then fused again into a big sheet. I made this little bag just to see how the material would sew up. It’s very much like Tyvec and easily went through my sewing machine.
I don’t know how safe it’s be, but this stuff would make a luminous lamp shade of some sort…
I’m not sure why I am so enamored with this. It seems like a big departure from what you usually see here on my blog. It’s pretty similar in concept, though, to my felting. It uses recycled materials, it’s easy to cut and apply graphic shapes, and there’s no raveling or need to finish raw edges. Weee!
I am definitely going to use this technique to make up a shopping tote. Next time I go to the store I will say NO NEW BAGS!
hmmm…very cool. i wonder if you can now sew the larger peice up to make a durable (and attractive!) bag that you can re-use a bunch….
You betcha! That’s exactly what I’m going to make…or maybe I’ll melt some more plastic first…it’s a bit addictive!
I’ve been saving up some bags these last few weeks to give this a try. So cool! I’m thinking bird wings.
Very fun, I wonder if you could make envelopes? I’ll give it a try tomorrow 🙂
that is fantastic.. what a fun idea happy day margie
I love recycled crafts, they are so clever and creative. I can’t believe you can make such beautiful things with plastic bags, I think I need to do some research on this. Ahh…the possibilities!
Creative & green – love it! I’ve been working on this reusable shopping bag. It’s my first sewing project! 🙂
Brilliant!!!
Hi, long time reader first time blogger. Help. My plastic bags are puckering up…what am I doing wrong. Any suggestions?
I think it just takes a lot of experimentation with heat and kind of bags. They say the thinnest bags work best layering 6-8 layers. I watched this video and found it helpful:
http://www.mefeedia.com/entry/2309732/
That’s a really great idea! 🙂
i didn’t know you could do that! i’m sending this to my mom – she’ll love it!
awesome! i’m thinking some wire frame and string lights with these an voila! a cute lantern display!
thanks so much for sharing 🙂