Selvage

[Tzporah]

Hey Darcy,

What do you guys do with the selvage that's leftover after cutting? I'm wondering if it would be any good for weaving with. Then maybe I could get my bags back from the cats.

Thanks!

[Darcy]

We throw the selvage away, though we'd rather not. I love your idea: can we send you some selvage to see if you can weave with it? Are there any colors that you don't want?

For those who aren't familiar with selvage, here's the Wikipedia entry. Attached is a photo of our Wasabi 500d Cordura cut-off selvage.

[Tzporah]

I'd love it if you could send me some! I'll take any color you'd like to send. Can I pay for the shipping? I don't want to take advantage of your generosity.

[Darcy]

I hope this isn't taking advantage of *your* generosity... but if you wanted to send us something that you made out of the selvage, that would be beyond cool. We'd photograph and feature it on our blog.

I know I have it somewhere, but if you could email me your address again, that'd be great.

[marbenais]

I love that idea!

Also, have y'all heard of the Molly Mutt dog/cat beds? They are excellent repositories for all manner of excess fabric & old clothing.

[Moose]

Dog & Cat beds

Hi Darcy,
I'd be willing to take a shot at crocheting a cat or dog bed and sending it back to you. If its good enough maybe you could donate it to your local shelter.

I have a plum dyneema synapse on order maybe you could stuff some in the box. I'll email you my order number if you're interested in sending some along.

I can only guess at how much it would take. To do what I'm thinking at least 125 yards, 250 would be iedal.

Tzporah, thank you for the great idea!
Happy travels,
Moose

[penny]

so funny, i saw that photo in tuesday's blog post and was thinking along the same lines.. wouldn't it be fun to knit/crochet/weave with it? hmm..

[Darcy]

marbenais, Moose -- Pet beds are a great idea! In our experience, anything that can't be easily washed and sanitized (sometimes every single day) gets tossed at an animal shelter. We're sending some selvage to a few people so far -- let's see what they come up with. Moose, can you email me your address?

[backpack]

Is the fabric unravelled before use so that one would have strand of fabric to work with?

I see weaving strips of fabric but not crocheting them.

Sorry to be so uninformed.

[Moose]

Is the fabric unravelled before use so that one would have strand of fabric to work with?

I see weaving strips of fabric but not crocheting them.

Sorry to be so uninformed.

Hi Backpack,
If the strands really look as pictured it should be pretty easy to crochet them. The longer the pieces the better. It appears they will be just like working with really fuzzy yarn. My only real concern is how "stiff" the strips will be. If its stiff you're right crocheting it will be more challenging. I figured what the heck, there's nothing to loose in trying. If it just goes in the trash anyway if any of us can make something useful with it its worth a shot. I'm anxious to see how it turns out. Doesn't take much to amuse me.
Happy travels,
Moose

[Moose]

Scraps arrived yesterday

Hi Darcy,
My box of dyneema scraps arrived yesterday. I spent a couple of hours trying to crochet with them. I gotta say, its NOT easy. They are slick and twist and turn every which way. I tried three different hooks before deciding on a Q, 10.5mm hook. The yellow and red fabrics seem to be the easiest to work with. The purple is so-so to work with and the gray is almost impossible. Odd since its all dyneema.

I'll keep at it but I'm not holding a lot of hope for anything useful coming out of it. I'm not a knitter but prehaps knitting the scraps would be more successful.

I will say my beautiful but evil cat found the box full of "string" VERY interesting. She took to it (that is attacked) immediately and without mercy. Maybe cat toys... I'll give that some thought.

If you have a few yards of the "fuzzy" selvages you could send along I'd be willing to try that too.

I truly hope everyone elses experience is different and they can work with the dyneema scraps!!! If I can't make this work I'm happy to send them back in hopes someone else can make use of them.

Thanks,
Moose

[gmanedit]

If it's hard to crochet, it would be hard to knit. Weaving might work. (Anybody remember potholder looms?)

[dorayme]

I got my box of scraps yesterday, it arrived while I was at Stitches South. I am "recuperating" from 8 hours of driving yesterday, and 6 hours of walking around on the show floor, as well as rolling in my fibery goodness. I haven't done anything but open the box and look at the selvedges. They look like they will be fun to work with. I need to determine how to work with them though!
I will post my findings, thanks for sending this and giving me a chance!

[Moose]

Hi dorayme,
I don't know what "Stitches South" is but the name tells me its got to be fun.

Did you receive dyneema or Cordura scraps? I do think the Cordura might be easier to work with.

I really liked marbenais' idea of pet beds. After struggling with the dyneema again this morning I just don't see a decent pet bed, or anything else coming from my efforts. Still working through the toy idea though.

Take it easy,
Moose

[Darcy]

We had a lot more Dyneema scraps than "fuzzy" Cordura scraps, but we did try to include some of each in the bags of selvage. Thanks for trying to make cool stuff with the selvage -- if the best use of it is as a cat toy, that's fine with us. I'm not a crafty person at all, but I was wondering if it can't be crocheted/knitted, could it be braided? I'm not sure how braided rugs are made, but a Dyneema/cordura braided rug could be pretty cool. That would be something we could feature in the Seattle store.

A note on the pet beds idea-- I don't know if those who want to make pet beds plan to use them for their own pets or donate them, but in my experience volunteering at animal shelters, they only accept (or use) pet beds that can be bleached and machine washed. Anything else will be used once and thrown away.