How to transform a blanket to a cape

The fashion world is notoriously haughty, and there are fabrics or clothing that, regardless of their value, are put aside because they are considered not so cool; one of them is the pile. Often associated with technical / sports clothing or for the home, pile is a synthetic fabric, cheap, warm, soft and from recent years, 100% recyclable. In fact, the PET polyester of which modern pile is made, it is obtained from the recycling of plastic bottles. The technical characteristics of the recycled fiber remain the same as the original, but the environmental savings are huge: less oil and less gas emissions (20 bottles are enough to make a blanket). Patagonia, the Californian brand that has exported technical (and sustainable) pile all over the world, has patented one, called Synchilla, 80% of which is made from recycled plastic bottles and the remaining 20% ​​from virgin polyester. The result is the Regulator, a fiber with exceptional thermal characteristics that perfectly imitates animal fur. Among the recent innovations, there are also the Uniqlo, YMC and Burberry piles, each with an interesting and modern approach to the fiber.

Starting from this awareness, the pile that we all have at home will certainly not be a recycled fabric, but we can manage to make it such, transforming a simple blanket into a cape to be worn on colder days. The blanket used is a 130x170 cm plaid, 100% polyester, white and with fringes at both ends. To make the future cape as minimal and simple as possible, I eliminated the fringes, leaving the two ends with a raw cut and without unnecessary finishing. Less is more.

How did I do it?

STEP #1

STEP #2

STEP #3

STEP #4

STEP #5