crafts   DIY   ideas   landscaping   low budget   outdoor  

So here is how to turn a 5 foot wide cloth into a 10+ foot wide cloth... that I used on the most embarrassing fence I have ever worked on.

 First, select your material.  Since this was going outside to top a bush garden and prevent deer from getting in, I selected a light weight but strong nylon.  How long will it last outdoors?  I don't know, but I hope for a full season.  I tested the tear directions and was happy to find that while it would tear a little if sliced width-wise, it did not tear much at all if cut length-wise (the direction I would need to cut it to expand it in width).

Second, fit your budget.  My budget for this project was $0.  Hence why I didn't just go buy two rolls of fencing and put where I needed it.  I already had the material on hand and had gotten the material on a super-clearance sale for 65 cents per yard.  So the whole thing cost me about $6.50 of material that I already had on hand.

Proof of concept.  I first cut a small section and did test slices alternating from each side.  Then I laid it out expanded to the estimated 10 ft that I would need for the width of my bush garden.

  

  

Estimate Length.  The measurement of un-expanded fabric was 14 inches and the expanded was an average of 10 inches, so with some quick calculations I was able to guesstimate that to stretch to the 10 foot width needed, I would need about 28 foot of material to get the 20 foot length.

Fold the Fabric.  First I tried folding it without any structure inside, which worked miserably, but then I found a board with close to the right width and wrapped the cloth around it 31 times.  Any one see a problem with this?  Yes, you probably guessed it.  Now there was no way to pull the board out of the middle.

After making a lot of frowny faces at it, I waited until hubby got home to give me the extra set of hands needed.  We folded 16 folds as we unwrapped the board, and then at that point the board was able to be pulled from the center of the rest giving me two sides that were reasonably able to be cut with very sharp scissors.

Cut the Fabric.  I cut the slices as a mirror image in each stack... alternating from one side and then the other like I did in the test.  Then folded the sides back to reveal the center and cut the final slits in that center piece one at a time.  If I had not made a mirror image, the center cuts would have been off-set and the center would not have been able to expand like the rest of the fabric.  If I had been doing a shorter length, I would have done it all in one folded set so that I would not have had to burn out brain cells to ensure my center would get cut right.