My Kite Using Recycled Materials

 

Recently I read the Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini set in Kabul in the 1960's about two boy's who enter into a kite-fighting tournament each year. In those days they had kite makers who would make their kites for them. Now in present day Kabul there won't be any kite makers left, fabrics will be in short supply and probably no more tournaments. So my inspiration comes from this book and therefore the kite I am making will be made from recycled materials as the young boy's from Kabul today would have to use scraps of paper, fabrics and string.

  

These are the materials I am using for the making of my kite.
There is an online plastic mail bag, old receipts, out of date      
exbihition tickets and a small shopping bag from the V&A 
made from plastic and some old bamboo canes.                         

 .



Cut the shoes out of the front cover of the V&A map guide and
glued onto the mail order packaging piece which I am using.   

 Cutting out the flower pattern from the spare plastic and gluing
onto the body of the piece I am going work on.                          



The next step after gluing the pattern piece onto my working
  

piece of plastic is to draw into the pattern with a black marker
pen.                                                                                             
.

Gluing a piece of packing lining onto the back of my plastic    
kite body for strenght for the next process.                                

.                            

My next process is to machine stitch into the shoe image using   
zig zag stitch in black cotton outlining the shoes.                          
The next step to machine stitch inside the shoe image with            

coloured cottons to enhance the image as shown in the picture
above.                                                                                        

 

This is the finished fabric for the kite. The yellow backing was too bright, so I used machine 
embroidery and black cotton to tone down the images.  

 

 

Now the fabric is finished I decided to make a sample kite out 
of paper and set about drawing and cutting the diamond shape
I am going to use.                                                                       
                                                                      
 

Photocopying the main body of the kite.

 

 

and the trim of the kite.

 

 

Glued the photocopies into the diamond shape kite and trimmed
to fit.                                                                                            



Now that I have finished the body of the kite need to add some
string on my kite so I am using recycled yarn from a jumper I   
 pulled back.                                                                                   
                                                                          
     



I have glued the yarn onto the main body and now tinting receipts
and exbihition tickets using Inktense pencils and damping them   
with a baby wipe for a more intense colour.                          
               



Twisted the tinted receipts and tied them one by one onto the 
yarn starting with the smallest first.                                            

Here is the finished sample kite. Now I can tweak, change colours and style if I wish too for my

real one!

 

 

 

 

This is the start of my real kite.

The cutting of the shape using paper.

Marking the shape out onto the fabric using a black marker pen.








 

Cutting out the kite shape. I have changed the
shape of the kite to a traditional one.

Cutting strips for the contrast edging from the V&A bag.







Machine zig zag the edging onto the body of the
kite using black cotton.

 

Cut bamboo canes to fit the kite.





                                                                      

Check that  the canes fit the body of the kite. 

                                               



Glued again to strengthen the joint.

Cut triangles out the contrast  material.

                                                                    
                                                                                 

Place the triangles in the four corners where the bamboo will
be and machine into place as shown in the picture below.

Machine the little triangle into place.

                         

Place the ends of the bamboo canes into the little triangle pockets. 

Trimming the paper tails into  narrow strips.

The bamboo frame is now in place. 

To secure the frame I have used a glue gun in each of the corner
of the kite.
 

The next stage is to dye the yarn using red ink. Using a old small
bowl to put some ink into it.

Add a little water.

Put yarn in the ink dye and leave for half an hour take out and
leave to dry. 

The next stage is to cut the dyed yarn into eighteen inches long
and I have glued the wool onto the top and bottom of the frame
using a glue gun.

The last stage is to attach the rest of the yarn to the yarn already  
 attached and I have again glued them together using the glue gun. 

 

The finished kite.



A closer view of the kite.

The kite is finished but will it fly ?



This is where my kite came from ......

all recycled materials that would have

ended up in the bin.

 

 

Unfortunatly my kite was broken in

transit so I hung it in a tree for full 

effect of flying. 

 

 

A bit of fun !!