Plastic bags have a way of piling up. One with the morning paper, another for the deli sandwich at lunch — a person can accumulate a dozen per day just going about her normal life.
Twenty-three-year-old Tiburon, Calif., crafter Alexis Berger found a clever way around the waste. From the humble cargo carriers, she weaves funky, fashion-forward purses that yelp with bright color and scream with feather-like fringe.
Berger learned to crochet as a child, but she didn’t think to turn grocery store satchels into high-style handbags until a class at the Rhode Island School of Design (she graduated in 2005) called for nonstandard materials. Today her creations, including plastic-bag earrings and house slippers, are a hit at craft fairs throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.
To make a purse, Berger lays a plastic bag flat,
with both handles to the right. She rolls the bag up
“like sushi,” slicing it to create loops, then inter-
twines these to form a chain, or a continuous “yarn”
that she crochets using standard hooks. It takes
about 50 grocery bags to produce a plastic purse.
Berger mines supermarket recycling bins and friends’ garbage cans in her search for multicolored treasures. She particularly likes the bright pink bags from Asian markets, and Whole Foods bags with their striking beige and green combination.
“I’m a functional hoarder,” Berger says. “But you also have to use the things you hoard, otherwise you’re just a collector, not a crafter.”
Aside from the artistic (and obvious eco) payoffs of Berger’s carryalls, the functional fabric she stitches has inherent benefits. Her handbags are incredibly light. Plus, you can smother your purse in peanut butter and wipe it right off.
“If you’re going to make a basket out of rattan that’s sold to make baskets, it doesn’t push you toward a new way of thinking about basket-making,” Berger says. “Unconventional materials present unusual challenges ... and opportunities.”
—Megan Mansell Williams
>> Plastic-bag Craft: picasaweb.google.com/alexis.berger
Photograph by Alexis Berger
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