I was glad to be back at Morris Park Library in the Bronx to run a new program funded by Bronx Council on the Arts through New York State Council on the Arts. ‘Art Recycled‘ was all about reuse, reduce, recycle, an environmentally friendly art program that was FREE.

You know all of those plastic grocery bags that fill up your kitchen cupboards? You can make PLARN out of them – yes, plastic yarn!!

Once you’ve made a ball of plarn you can make all kinds of useful items. Bags, hats, shoes, dish scrubbers, even an outdoor bird feeder!

I also had my local supermarket donate tons of plastic bags, and we even had temporary recycling bin at the library for the duration of the program.

All in all 251 people engaged in the program, with children, teens, adults and seniors learning how to crochet with plarn. For our celebration public event we had a guest speaker Naika Colas a eco-fashion designer to talk to us about recycling in New York City, and she gave us great tips on how to recycled responsibly.

Here are some samples of participants work –

And here are sample bags, baskets and that bird feeder that I created –

I have been approached by New York Public Library to host more plarn workshops in library branches in the Bronx, specifically for senior programming, so I am happy to continue my plarn adventure! I am also thinking of designing and creating plarn bags for sale in my store. I am also developing a FREE plarn string bag pattern for this bag right here –