This is your calling card to do the same. Make a rug, I triple-dog dare you. Don't know how?
Here's a breakdown of how I made The Floor:
Before fully getting into it, in that rb I said:
We could have so much mroe than what the shop offers- it could be glorious. I couldn't get tuft chin hair or flower power blush floor with $45 dollars at their store, but I could get it irl for the low low price of like a week-straight worth of work.
Ha... haha.... No. It took a lot longer than that. MUCH longer than that.
This is a little jitter lapse with the dates I worked on him. In each pic I spent around 2-3 hours working on him, except the last few in August. Those I spent like 3-5 hours on because I needed him to be finished before the semester started. My goal was to get him finished and sitting in my dorm, and I fucking did :)
= - - =
Starting from the top though, since I had the design after making the rb post linked, I decided on the size. I was watching the video showcasing him as a rug, and I gauged he was about a yard wide, so I based my measurements on that. I knew that I was going to needle punch him instead of latch hook him because I felt the punching would be faster. And well... I've done punch needling before this project so I figured it'd be faster than learning a new technique.
Here's what I mean, for a frame of reference.
Since I went the punching route, I knew he'd need a frame to be punched out on. To keep the fabric taut and all that jazz. Luckily for me I had a bunch of wood hanging around from an old bed's slots, so I made the frame out of that. Similarly, I had a bunch of fabric lying around.
Word of advice: DO NOT USE NORMAL FABRIC WITH A NORMAL PUNCH NEEDLE YOU WILL TEAR THAT SHIT UP. Learned that the hard way-
The fabric I used was NOWHERE near "loose" enough for a big punch needle. Loose in the sense that it has more holes in it. On the left is the fabric you're supposed to use when making a rug (Monk's Cloth), and on the right is the fabric I used (pic not of the exact cloth but close).
Notice that the holes on the right are a LOT smaller... I did not realise this mattered until I'd already primed the frame and drew him on with a sharpie.
Bask in his glory.
To give a breif on how I did this, I hooked my 'puter up to the TV with an HTMI, opened the image I had of him (it's a bit different than the of doodle in the rb b/c I wanted brighter colours), and literally held the wooden frame with the fabric on it up to my TV and traced it. I traced it from the inside first so that it would be mirrored on the side I would be punching on. If you draw the design you want to punch on the side you're punching on please mirror the image first.
Forgot to say, yes I had a staple gun too, so that didn't add into the price of making this Floory rug.
After this point, it was pretty smooth sailing, sorta... It would've been if I'd bought a thinner yarn for the main body. See, in this whole experiment, I was very dead set on keeping this project under $45 so I bought a large ball of cheap yarn. I tried to gauge how much I would need with the needle height (about 3/4 inch I used), but I got scared and just wound up buying this giant green ball that I needed to de-ply to work with properly. You could kinda see it in the jitter-lapse below, but yeah.
Before punching with this Red Heart size 4 yarn, I had to separate 1 of the ply FOR THE ENTIRE RUG. I had to pull out a substantial amount from the big skein, de-ply it, roll it back into a ball, then needle punch with it.
And why did I have to do this? BECAUSE I WAS USING THE WRONG FABRIC AND NEEDLE PUNCH FOR MAKING A WHOLE ASS RUG!!
I didn't know that the needle punch needle I had was an embroidery one, NOT a normal needle punch needle. Notice that it's small, and embroidery floss is the thing going through the hole and NOT size 4 yarn. And for the right, notice that it's also kinda small but the needle itself is a lot thicker, the channel that the yarn is going through is wider than the yarn itself- and that it's YARN AND NOT EMBROIDERY FLOSS.
Needless to say, it was aggravating and made the process take a lot longer than it should've. It wasn't impossible, I mean, you see him finished above and below, but it made it WAY more tedious, since a the thicker yard, even after being de-ply'd, still got stuck in the needle punch needle. After wresling with that off and on for... what about 4 months give or take, it was on to gluing and backing.
Going on the record to say that Tuft the World, Sam Made That, Shop Last., AJ MAKES, and BrokenBlvds' thread were the backbone of my glue searching, and rug-making experience. If you genuinely want to make a tuff rug (hand-punched or otherwise) their guides are so helpful <3
But for real, finding the right glue was a lot harder than anticipated. Many people said to use Roberts 3095 adhesive for rugs along with another glue, but I didn't have the funds for that, nor was planning to buy a whole gallon of rug glue I'd only for 1 project. I took up BrokenBlvds thread as my glue of choice, even though they were asking for something better. So far (about 3 months of use and a couple cleanings) the Roberts 6700 glue is holding up fine. The thing that isn't, is the yarn. After one vacuuming, fuzzies have been obscuring his eyes and junk. It's not bad, or even that noticeable, but I do miss his original state. That's what I get for using cheap yarn. I still love him to death tho.
Side tangent aside, I also used the 6700 because it has less of an odour, and I planned on bringing him to my dorm right when he was dry. While that was drying outside, I worked on the backing. The OG Floory rug had a nonslip backing attached (if I remember correctly), but mine does not! In similar fashion to the fabric of the rug itself, I also used left over fabric as his backing. For structure, I used some of my father's old uniform pants, and to make it more like dirt, I used an old bed sheet.
I stitched them together in a quilt-ish design so that the layers would be attached throughout the rug. That was a rush, but when I finished it I went out back and stuck it on there with a bit more Roberts 6700. When it was cured enough to come inside (3 days after gluing) I worked on the nonslip portion.
Had a rectangle of rug grip mat stuff, stuck some pins around the edges of Floory, traced the pins then cut it out. It's a little hard to see but looking up top, you can see a few of the pins sticking out around his edge.
After getting that, I released him from the frame, "pinked" his edges, and whip-stitched the edge shut.
That hurt my thumb SO FUCKIN BAD- Had to have pliers next to me for most of the whip-stitching, because it was so hard to get through the glue with a blunt needle. I used a blunt needle 'cause it was the only needle I had that could hold the yarn, and to keep in the spirit of the experiment... No way I was buying a needle when I had a needle that could technically work.
Now, in the name of the whole experiment, let me do a breakdown of the things I bought verse used:
Items Bought for project:
Green Red Heart Yarn - $15
Roberts 6700 Carpet Adhesive - $9
Wrong sized punch needle - $3
Total spent on Floory rug: $27
Items used in general:
9 different colours of yarn
About 1.5 yards of polyester/cotton blend fabric
1/2 of a flat sheet from a bedsheet set
1 pair of uniform pants
1 embroidery needle punch needle
4 (roughly) yard-long wood slots from a bed
Nails and screws (and the tools for those)
1 Staple gun & about 70 staples
(I fucked up a lot of them & restapled)
A sewing machine
Pinking shears
Tapestry needles
etc...
Total if I had to buy all that: More than $45!
I put the lists side by side to say that I know saying "Oh just make it yourself" is easier said than done. If I didn't have all the shit I did, I would've just bought him myself like any sane person would. But no, I had the will and the materials, and I wanted The Floor in my dorm. And now here he is, along with my crazy ass Jhariah x hfjone bag...
That's for a different post- but forgive me, it's the most recent photo I have of him.
All and all, I had a good time working on him! It was very therapeutic to hunch on the floor of my living room and stab fabric a gazillion times to make The Floor from Inanimate Insanity. It drove me a bit inanimate insane, but honestly, I wake up every morning and see his face and it makes things better. So in reality, I guess you could say it was the friends I made along the way- thanks for watch
I’m moving soon!! So of course, me being insane, I have to make an interior design moodboard for myself 😌😌
Here’s my issue: I love utilitarianism and raw materials, but I also love plants and soft tactile fabrics. I love getting my hands dirty and building things but I also love cozy and calm. I couldn’t live without the other; I value the balance of form and function within my living space. So I created this moodboard to help tie those conflicting needs of mine together :)) I LOVE interior design and wanna get better at it, so hopefully having this on hand will help me stay on track when buying/designing for my new space! 😤😤
