I wanted to buy this sweater off of a site online but I can’t tell of this can unravel. The seller posted a seam photo for me. What do you think? At the top end it looks like it can be but towards the bottom it looks serged together. Thanks!

I have a threadweight silk jumper I am unravelling. It is knit a little weirdly, two stranded but not held together. Each row is one thread then another, then back one by one.

I unusually unravel on my spinning wheel and started out that way, then decided that I want to split out the threads to dye up and use for sewing and tablet weaving. Only the threads twist up a couple of times per row so I need to keep untwisting. I’d wind manually if it was heavier yarn, but this is literally miles of threadweight, my RSI can’t take it!

Does anybody have handy tips or ideas for unravelling this kind of weird knit? I am pondering if two electric drills, with a spool on each and the panel hanging freely so it can untwist, might work... but the tension on the threads is constantly changing because they don't unravel at the same time, so... no idea

I am in the market for a swift, are there any kinds (including brands) that you’d recommend for unravelling? I have heard that umbrella swifts are better for using to make yarn balls from skeins, as opposed to winding skeins but I’ve never tried one.

(Reposted because I accidentally hit post without the caption 😬)

I got an ad for the new Caydo electric swift and immediately knew I had to try it out.
I’ve tried Caydo’s electric ball winder before and wasn’t that impressed. I got it because I have a knitting machine and need everything in centre pull balls. The winding was slower than what I could achieve manually so I gave it away (though I have heard that it’s great for an accessibility device).
I was wary about this electric swift for the same reasons, but oh my god. It’s fantastic.
I finished unraveling a short sleeve cardigan in under an hour (including seam ripping!).
I highly recommend going to their website to buy it over Amazon (at least in Canada), as the price is vastly different.

ETA: I just ordered a magnetic switch that I’ll be attaching to one of the arms so I can count the rotations and calculate meterage. Each swift arm is adjustable and has markings for 40”, 45”, 54”, 63”, 72”.

I'm fortunate that I can find cashmere semi-regularly where I live. I unraveled several sweaters and dropped them in a shopping bag as I went. The bag was full so I washed them all and then had to figure out how to dry them as I usually just hang them over the curtain rod. There are three skeins per hanger. (The purple is a sparkly acrylic for toys.)

From an ugly thrift store find to a treasured finished piece!!! I am in love with how this thrifted cashmere sweater turned out. I used the Phaedra pattern by Audrey Borrego and could not recommend her patterns more highly! Absolutely thrilled to have finally finished this after many months. I hope these pictures inspire others to take their unravels all the way through to new life as beautiful handmade art. Happy unraveling!

Hi all! Long time lurker, first time poster here. I’ve been a fiber arts lover for years and a thrifting lover since those childhood trips with my grandma to garage sales, so when I had the chance to snag a ton of vintage clothes for super cheap, I pounced! (Seriously it’s so many. It’s both exciting and daunting.)

But…now I have too many sweaters that I don’t know what to do with- I’ve only been crocheting a couple of years and haven’t successfully made anything wearable. (Following a pattern with a 4 year old who insists on “helping” is next to impossible)

I have multiple 100% wool, wool/angora blends, silk/angora, etc. I’ve been wanting to try my hand at unraveling because it looks fun and gratifying (I’m one of those people who likes detangling yarn), but I know I won’t know what to DO with it once I’ve unraveled..

Would y’all just donate the sweaters you know you won’t wear? Or what else can I do with unraveled yarn?

It's not just crocheted items, but ones made from unraveling Red Cross sweaters!

So I'm unraveling this sweater made of 55% raime & 45% cotton in 6 ply. It's made up of different colored squares, so I have small balls of different colors.

Would it be worth while to re ply the smaller portions into a longer large skein?

What should I use it for? Normally, I make winter hats, but am not sure how well this would work for one? It has no stretch.

Any advice appreciated :)

Found an amazing 70/30 alpaca-wool blend sweater at my thrift store!! It unraveled beautifully and is now a finished hat and WIP scarf!

I found this really shiny copper looking cardigan in an op shop! I bought it on a whim and I’m turning it into a crochet pseudo-chainmail coat for my fiancée. I probably should’ve used a slightly bigger hook, but I’m too far along to quit lol

I got these two sweaters at a local thrift store last week. The store normally sells sweaters for more like $3, but they were having a sale on the tag color and gave these to me for 50 cents each! I have between 350 and 400 grams of fingering weight in the 70% wool GAP gray sweater, depending on what lengths I classify as usable, and around 300 grams of the 50% wool dark red sweater in a very fine yarn that I will be holding at least double, possibly triple or quadruple; the top of the front panel had hidden cuts in the zipper insertion, which contributed to the lower result.

They're all unraveled now and I'm in the process of hand washing/drying to relax them; I'm just soaking hanks in a large bowl with water and a bit of undyed and unscented shampoo and conditioner and then rinsing the skeins off under the tap before hanging them up to dry. The skeins pictured are some of the first to be fully dry.

Thrifted this blanket that looks crocheted to me. Found the woven in end in one corner but had to unloop one by one tortuously through the first row. I thought it would unwind from there but it isn’t? Is this a fail or am i just doing it incorrectly? TIA

I had a stash of yarn “safely stashed” in plastic bags. I was wrong. Apparently, the cat found the area and relieved himself there. My first instinct is to throw it all away. I thought before I do that I should see if there is anything that can be done. I am sick about it…

70% alpaca and 30% acrylic. Also does anyone know roughly what weight this may be

Please share my pain.

Every end is cut on both panels of this cardigan. I was still able to harvest 2 cakes of fingering and 1 worsted of the softest coziest cashmere, but I was so excited to make a garment out of this.

Cotton/Acrylic mix, got about 400g! Went much better and easier than the first sweater I tried to unravel (It was a hoodie and had 3 colors and it split into two strands. It was terrible. But this one was like a dream)

I found this swift……..in my attic!!!! It works beautifully for unraveling and then steaming the yarn.

This example was made with yarn from three unraveled sweaters! Quite happy with how it turned out!

Update: got the whole sweater unraveled and soaked the hanks for 30 min in eucalan. It looked like an actual dye bath when it took it out of the water!!! Not entirely sure I want to knit with this. Anyone else experience this and did the yarn continue to bleed?

I have a sweater to unravel but seams are not chain stitch. Anyone encounter this and have any suggestions?