What to do with Waste Wool?
Written and Designed by Brittany of @Bee _ Ritt _ Fiber_ Arts on Instagram Please follow her for more inspiration and creativity with the fiber arts. You can even buy some of her gorgeous art yarn weavings at her Website .
So what to do with Waste Wool?
Unspinnable, maybe, but definitely not unusable! You've probably spun through a bundle of roving and pulled out bits and pieces of neppy, matted, slubby fibers. You pull them out because they don't make for a nice, smooth, clean yarn. Don't throw those bits away! Below I am going to share with you a few creative and eco friendly ways you can use your unspinnable wool.
Wet and Needle Felting
Felting is perfect for waste wool! Matted is no problem since that's your felting end goal. Use it for the core wool for little needle felted creations or keep your waste wool sorted by color so you can have an endless palette to choose from when "painting" on your wet felting details.
Stuffing
I've heard many people say they use waste wool and yarn scraps as stuffing for handmade pillows and toys. It's natural and better for the environment than using polyester filling. Just make sure to use the regular pest prevention methods you would employ for the rest of your wool: keep in a well lit and busy area of your home and make sure they are moved around frequently.
Compost
Because wool is naturally biodegradable you can add it to your compost. Or simply use it to line your flower bed for weed prevention and moisture retention for your plants. Wool has many fertilizer benefits and can actually work to filter out certain toxins in your soil and water, so it is ideal for garden use as well.
Art Batts and Art Yarn
The more texture and color the better! Use a drum carder or blending board and blend those neppy and slubby bits into rolags or a batt for the perfect art yarn spin. When you have all that texture already you don't even need to spin in a fancy way. A chunky single or simple two ply yarn will produce amazing results.
Skip towards the end of this video to see some mixed fiber batts in the making to get some ideas of how you could incorporate some waste wool with other fibers.
My Local Wool, our sister site is a fantastic place to find farmers near you or across the globe who would love to hook you up with wool of all types including “ waste wool” please help our efforts for helping the fiber arts community.
If you’d like to learn more about our efforts to support the fiber arts with My Local Wool and get some fantastic spinning education and yarn design content please check it out here.
