Hello crafters!

Lately everyone is trying to be more conscious of their waste. I think this is really great and I am loving trying out all these zero waste products. Of course my favourite things are the things that I can make myself. If you haven’t already you might want to check out my other zero waste DIY tutorials. I have had great success using my DIY wool dryer balls and my washable twine scrubbies!

This tutorial will walk you through the process of how I made my own roll of unpaper towels! I am definitely guilty of using paper towels to wipe up small spills that could have easily been wiped with a reusable unpaper towel! I’m sure I will still keep some paper towels on hand for extra messy cleanups (like for when my dog decides to eat grass and then throw it up in the house 🙁 ) But having these unpaper towels as my first go-to should save a bunch of paper towel from going in the garbage while also saving me some dollars!

On a side note our city actually takes paper towel in the green compost bin so I don’t have to feel as guilty about throwing it out but I’m sure no waste is still better than composting!

Supplies needed to make your unpaper towels

• Stiff plastic mesh (I used garden mesh)
• Snaps and snap pliers
• Thin cotton fabric for backing
• Thread in complimentary colour
• Sewing machine
• 100% cotton dishcloths (10)
• Ruler
• Iron
• Hot glue gun

Cutting out fabric

The dishcloths that I used are 12″ squares. For this reason I cut my fabric into 13″ squares to give a half inch seam allowance all the way around the outside. If your dishcloths are a different size simply cut your fabric to whatever size your cloths are plus a half inch seam allowance around the edge.

Once you have cut out all ten squares you will need to trim the corners off of each square so that it folds in without too much bulk.

Next fold in each of your seam allowances and iron the seams flat.

Sewing your unpaper towels

Now it is time to sew your cotton fabric backing to your dishcloths!

Take one dishcloth and one fabric square and line up the first edge. Sew a straight line around the entire outside of the cloth.

Then sew one diagonal line from corner to corner. This will prevent the two pieces of fabric from moving around when you wash your unpaper towels.

Repeat with each of your dishcloths.

Making inner roll

Now that your unpaper towels are ready you can make the inner roll to hold all of them! I’m sure you could find a variety of materials that would work for this but I used a stiff garden mesh that I found at the dollar store.

Start by cutting out your mesh. Since the towels are 12″ squares you will want your tube to be 12″ long. A paper towel tube is about 5″ around but you will need an overlap when you roll it up so I cut mine to be 6″ width.

Once you have cut your 12″ x 6″ piece of mesh you will need to roll it up with the 1″ overlap and attach your first snap 1″ from the end to hold it together.

Then attach a snap 1″ from the other end. (I am aware that I accidentally put one female and one male snap on my tube :/ doesn’t make too much of a difference but try to use the female snaps on your tube)

Then use a small amount of hot glue to seal up the middle part of the tube.

Attaching snaps

Onto the final step, time to attach all of the snaps to your towels and snap them onto the roll!

Take your first towel and attach a male snap to each of the top corners 1″ from the sides. The caps will be on the fabric side of your unpaper towel.

Snap these two snaps onto the roll. Eeeeeek so exciting 🙂

Move down to the bottom of the first towel and attach two female snaps on the corners 1″ from the sides. These snaps will have the caps on the dishcloth side.

Repeat this process all the way down attaching and rolling up your unpaper towels as you go.

There you have it! Your own roll of super cute reusable paper towels 🙂

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial as much as I enjoyed making it. If you have any questions or comments I would love to hear them below in the comment section!

Happy crafting!