Knitted purse from Union Rescue Mission T-shirt

Today I am starting a blog chronicling my adventures in repurposing old, unloved and/or unflattering T-shirts into something new. In this post I will show you how I created a purse from two Union Rescue Mission T-shirts that my family and I wore at the Mission's annual Thanksgiving dinner. Even Paris Hilton wore one. I wonder what she did with hers?

Here's the T-shirts. My first step was to dye them.

After I de-constructed the T-shirts, I cut the front and back into continuous strips to make the "yarn." Once I knitted the main body of the purse, I selected a color for the top band from my T-shirt fabric stash. I chose a novelty yarn, also, to knit in with the rust/orange T-shirt strips.

After I finished knitting the purse, I chose metal handles - the kind that you can slide your own beads onto. I used some wooden beads that I had left over from another project. They coordinated quite nicely, I thought.

One of my philosophies when creating my products it that, while they're a work of art, they must be functional and durable. This purse needed to be lined so that it wouldn't stretch when full of all the necessities one carries in a purse. So I lined it with a tan silk fabric and also sewed a orange grosgrain ribbon inside the top band for stability. I also added a snap at the top.

My purse is finished. Does anyone know Paris Hilton's address? I was thinking if i sent it to her, maybe the purse would show up in In Touch magazine!

Thanks for looking at my first T-cycle project. Please "follow" me so you won't miss next week's project!