Recycled Paper Baskets

Step 1: Recycled Paper Baskets

Want to make something useful, creative and eco-friendly? Well, you can always use old newspapers, magazines, calenders, brown paper bags and so on to make a number of unique and awesome craft projects.

Recycling old newspaper, magazines, calender into eco-friendly baskets is one of the amazing eco-friendly craft projects :) These baskets turn out pretty sturdy and useful... besides, eco-friendly crafts always refresh and satisfy your mind.

I'm sure we all have loads of old newspapers or any kind of old paper stocks at home, so grab all the stuffs and lets do recycling ^_^

Step 2: Materials Needed

To make these baskets you'll need:

1. Paper - newspaper, old magazine, old calenders, brown paper etc,
2. Clothespin - 3-4,
3. Stapler.

Step 3: Making Paper Strips

First of all we need to make lots of strips out of paper,

Making strips would vary with the thickness of the paper you're using,

For thick papers such as, old magazines, old calenders etc cut 2 inches wide and 14 inches (at least) long paper strips,
Fold the papers into half 2 times to make the strips sturdy.

For newspaper I had to cut 3 inches wide strips and used all the length there was,
Folded the strip into half and then into even thirds to make sturdy strips.

Make as many paper strips as you want.

Step 4: The Bottom

Before starting the weave you should know that to make this basket you'll need to use even number of strips. The number of strips should be 'proportional' even after dividing them into half, for instance you can't use 6 strips because there will be 3 strips after dividing them into half.

For this basket I used 8 paper strips. 4 strips for each sides.

Take 2 folded strips and mark their center,
Place them in a cross making sure both centers touch,
Now start adding (weaving over and under) strips on both sides of the cross,
I made a 4 X 4 square for this basket.

You can add more strips if you want to, but make sure that the number of strips are even and equal on all sides.

Step 5: Preparing the Base

After weaving the bottom of the basket you'll need to prepare the base,

You can either staple or glue the 4 edges, otherwise the weaves would come off,

Use a marker or pencil to draw a square on the base as shown in the 2nd picture of this step, this will be the base of the basket,

Now, fold the woven base along the marked part and release the fold.

Do the same for all 4 sides.

Step 6: The Corners

This is the tricky part.

You have to start weaving from one side,

Divide the strips into half of any one side and start weaving with the center strips (see picture),

Weave over and under, starting from the center strips of any one side,

Now, go for the next corner but make sure to pin the woven corner with a clothespin.

Weave all 4 corners similarly and pin at least 3 woven corners otherwise they'll come off.

Step 7: Weaving the Basket

After making the corners of the basket rest of the weaving would seem easy.

Take the clothespin off one by one while weaving each side,

Simply weave over and under,

Continue to weave over and under until the basket reaches its required length or until an inch remains on the shortest strip.

Step 8: Completing the Basket

Done weaving the basket? good, now lets complete the edge of the basket.

Starting from the shortest strips, hold the 2 strips (diagonally, as they are),

Fold the strip inside (which is over or outside),

Now fold the other strip inside (which is under),

Turn around the basket as you'll need to see the inside,

Weave the second folded strip under the strip next to it (inside the basket).

Continue to fold the edge using this technique until it's done.

Using this technique the edge of the basket will be secure enough and you won't need to use glue. The basket will turn out sturdy enough after it's complete.

You can make baskets of different sizes and colors depending on the size, number and pattern of the strips.

Enjoy!