I want to be clear from the outset that I can take absolutely no credit for the invention of this nifty little craft. A friend of mine shared the following link with me on how to make a scarf from an old t-shirt (absolutely no sewing required).

So I tried it out and was hooked:

Then she found this nifty variant.

Which I also tried:

The process, as you can see from the above sites, is incredibly simple. It involves no sewing whatsoever, just a t-shirt, a pair of scissors, and (depending on the t-shirt and how you choose to make your scarf) the ability to tie knots. It’s one of those fantastic projects that can be done well even by those who are the crafting equivalent of can’t-boil-water.

I made several of these scarves myself, and gave a number of them as Christmas gifts. I wasn’t sure what people would think (they do seem a little odd at first), but they were very well received. My brother’s friend wore hers frequently over the days after Christmas.

They’re surprisingly warm, and good for fall and spring weather when you don’t quite need a scarf, but don’t quite not need one, either. Or for wearing indoors in winter when the house is chilly and your sweater is letting in a draft around the neck.

I’ve found that I prefer the ones with knots, although I thought they looked a bit weird, initially. One thing I tried was cutting strips of t-shirt in varying lengths, so the knots would be sure to fall at different intervals in each successive loop.

I also experimented with using multiple colours in a single scarf, with some nice results. I call the second image (below) my Lego scarf. One of the ones I gave for Christmas was in white and black, and looked remarkably classy.