Coffee Sacks

Saw this great Scarecrow Kit on Hen & Hammock and being a dedicated crafter thought I’d try one out for myself.  I bought 10 coffee sacks on Ebay for £7 - bargain!  I’m pretty sure they’re giving them away out the back of nearby specialist coffee shops, but I had a rotten cold and couldn’t face the mad conversation which was likely to ensue.  That’s the beauty of Ebay - anonymity.

Anyways, they arrived in a big box and I hid them away before my husband could raise an eyebrow.  They’re actually rather nice things - lovely jute, loose weave, cool prints, and there are millions of them cluttering up landfills so they tick the recycling boxes too.  And obviously they smell of luverly rich, dark coffee.  Now I’ve got them cluttering up the spare room, I’m pretty sure I’m not going to get round to doing anything scarecrowlike with them anytime soon (what was I thinking? We’ve only got a tiny garden anyway), so I’m thinking of other uses … like upholstering a chair, could be great.

If you feel driven to do the same, use items like Hen & Hammock’s peg bag for inspiration, and Etsy have a heap of cool bags and purses for sale made out of coffee sacks (with varying results).  If you can’t be bothered to go to your local coffee outlet, I’d be wary of paying anything over £1 each for these things.  Although they’re invaluable to the crafter, there are thousands of them out there and they’re not hard to come by.   Another resource is coffee community forums, such as Too Much Coffee, where coffee shop owners are posting questions about what to do with their sacks!

They’re the poor, modern cousins of the mightily expensive vintage linen grain sacks and I can see big things for them.