My newest obsession (as of this morning) is learning how to make rag rugs. Don’t ask me why, but I just love the look of these pretty little rugs. I love how you can get such a home spun look, and yet have it be completely modern, depending on the fabrics you use.
If you feel like channeling your inner pioneer woman, keep reading! I found couple of great tutorials, and you can decide which you like best.
The first is on the Moda Bake Shop website
The tutorial has nice pictures and instructions for making the braids. The only thing I don’t love about this tutorial is that it requires 4 ½ yards of white fabric, and 1 honey bun. For those of you who don’t sew or quilt, a honey bun is a collection of precut fabric. A honey bun always has 40 strips, 1 ½ inches by the width of the fabric. The strips are a sampling of coordinated fabrics from one collection. Precuts are always a little expensive, but they are really convenient for quilting because everything is factory cut and already coordinated. That allows you to skip all the cutting and go straight to the fun part: piecing! But for a rug, I’m not sure I would want to spend $30-$40 on a honey bun. I don’t want to be big downer, but if you do the math, 40 strips x 1 ½ inches is only 60 inches total. I can’t think of any circumstance in which I would pay $40 for a yard and half (or so) of cotton fabric. I know, I know…you’re paying for convenience, but still. In any case, it’s a nice tutorial, and the rug is gorgeous.
This second rag rug tutorial from Craft Passion shows how she made her rugs from old cotton sheets. This tutorial is different from the Moda tutorial because she shows how to machine sew the rug, and also put on a backing to make it nice and sturdy. Of course this appealed to me because I love using junk to make new things, right?
So what do you do if you don’t have a bunch of sheets on hand? Go to the thrift store, of course!
Now I realize there’s something kind of nasty about buying old sheets, but just try not to think about it too hard. Buy the sheets, take them home, and put them directly in the washer. Wash twice, if it makes you feel better! When they come out of the dryer, fold them flat, or even iron them, and get ready to make strips. Sure, it’s not as easy as using precuts, but with sheets, you can typically tear the fabric, rather than cutting, which is really fast. Just measure 1 ½ inches in, snip the edge, and tear away! Also, if there’s any part of the sheet that looks a little thread bare, or is questionable in some other way, just don’t use that part. The strips do not have to be a particular length, so just cut off anything you don’t want to use.
At the end of the day, you’re just going to put in on the floor and walk all over it anyway!
So you choose:
- Tutorial #1: Bright and beautiful hand sewn rag rug made with quick and easy precut fabric.
- Tutorial #2: Economical, sturdy, and still beautiful rag rug made with cheap old sheets.
I don’t know when I will get to this project, but if you make one of these, please let me know how it goes!
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