Woven basket: recycled paper bags

sideview basket
Easter is coming! How about adding these cute little “upcycled” woven basekts to your Easter Craft projects?! All you need are some brown paper bags and you can start weaving! A few years ago, we posted how to cover a cereal box with paper twist (click here). This basket is a little bit more difficult but doable even with young crafters. If you are doing this project as part of as an ESL program it is perfect for teaching the following words: basket, bottom, sides, handle, strip, cut, over and under!

You will need:
Brown paper bags
Hot glue

Let’s get started:
Step 1: Cut out strips of brown paper. My strip were the length of the bag and around 1,5 cm wide.

Step 2: Weave together 12 strips of paper to create the bottom of the basket.
bottom basket

Step 3: Cut out 5 more strips of paper (always the same width) and glue together lengthwise. You will use this long strip to build the sides of the basket. In a corner of the bottom of the basekt, fold up the first strips and start weaving. I glued the long horizontal piece in place in the corner with hot glue in order to make the weaving a little bit easier for the kids.
start side

Step 4: Using your long strip work your way around the bottom of the basket “growing the sides” upwards.
side basekt 2

Step 5: You can keep adding pieces to your long strip to make the sides of the basket higher. Once you have reached the desired height, fold the left over from the bottom down and glue or weave into the side.

Step 6: Cut out six pieces of brown paper and braid together to make two handles. Fold and glue down ends to make a little neater.
braid handle and glue flat

Step 7: Glue handles onto basket.
with handle

Your baskets are all done! Now you just need to fill them. Try out our Yarn Eggs or Ukrainian Eggs!

Have fun