Every once in awhile I see a project on Ravelry that just bowls me over with it’s awesomeness. This is one of those that just wowed me with the sheer resourcefulness of it all! Meet Emma – Leftlady on Ravelry, a Mom of 3 girls who lives on the south coast of Australia. She has made the greatest rug that looks like a doily, but is giant sized. It is made from about 900 meters of 10 mm upholstery piping she received with the purchase of an upholstery machine and one huge crochet hook. She created this without a pattern with only 2 years crochet experience!
Emma shared, “My inspiration for this rug came while surfing the net one day, I came across a link to a site called ladiesandgentlemen.com - this amazingly talented lady made her mega doily with her bare hands, no hook! But I fell in love with the idea immediately and it wasn’t long before I remembered that I had a reel of cotton piping out in the garage. In one of those spur of the moment decisions I hopped in the car to head down to my local craft shop to pick up a big enough hook to start straight away. The biggest I could find was a 15mm one, about the thickness of my thumb. I spent about an hour looking at various doily patterns on ravelry but was sure that there would be gauge issues when it came to trying a pattern so I decided to wing it and make up the pattern as I went.”
When I asked Emma how long it took to complete this project, she said, “I’m a self confessed procrastinator, and this project is proof of that once again. It took me 6 months to complete. When really I think there would not be more that 10-12 hours work in it. I found it quite hard on the fingers and wrists as each stitch really needed to be coaxed through, but still 6 months is a long time. It has been ‘lived on’ in that time as well, which with 3 little ones I’m sure you can imagine means juice, crackers and lots of grotty little feet and fingers all over it. But it’s really held up quite well, it has just gone through its first wash and came out brighter than ever!”
Cost of this project? $3.45 for the hook!
Result? Priceless!
(Emma is one of four crafty Moms’ who blog collaboratively at The Handmade Rainbow)
15 Comments
It (and it’s creator) are even better in real life! Champion Em!
We couldn’t agree more, Cindy!
So clever!
I love this rug!! I’ve got giant knitting needles but not giant crochet hooks so maybe I’ll do something similar. Just knit instead.
Make sure to share if you do, Andrea!
That is so inspirational! What an awesome project!
I hope she wins a “Bobby” (Ravelry award) for it!
Hey, I forgot about those awards! This is one I’d definately nominate.
this doily rug turned out fantastic. i’ve started one as well with zpagetti yarn but didn’t really enjoy to make it. but i love the outcome! wow!
Looks like alot of work, Lou! Share a photo on our FB page when you get it done!
This is so beautiful! I wish I had the time to make something so amazing. I might just have to stop my business and takes. Whirl at it!
This looks so great! How much yarn did you have to use and what kind did you have for the project?
Hi Grace,
I believe Emma said she used 900 meters of upholstery piping. I agree, great project!
That is awesome!!! I so need to learn how to crochet… and then somehow source 900 meters of upholstery piping because I WANT ONE OF THOSE
LOL! I know! Isn’t it great? I’m way impressed with it. No pattern!!!!
Did the 15 mm hook work? I have 9mm cotton rope coming to me and I was wondering what I size would work…
thanks!
That’s what Emma used, Alecia! How exciting – hope you’ll share yours when it’s complete!
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[...] make them from some old jeans • I’ve started working on a giant doily rug similar to this one, although I’m making the pattern up as I go along. I also started to do a crocheted decorative [...]