Recycled Hair Accessories

Are you in the mood to get crafty? Do you love to recycle? Check out these DIY recycled hair accessories made from used drinking straws! I call them “hair hearts.” It’s the perfect eco-friendly craft project for Valentine’s Day!

Recycled Hair Accessories

Earth… Will you be my Valentine?

Materials

  • Used Drinking Straws 
  • Scissors
  • Bobby Pins

How to Make Recycled Hair Accessories

Step 1: Find & Prepare the Straws

The straws for your recycled hair accessories, or hair hearts, must be used for this to be an eco-friendly project! Please don’t buy plastic straws! When I’m at a restaurant I usually tell the server I don’t need a straw, but sometimes they bring them anyway. That’s how I get straws for hair hearts these days. 

You can also ask friends and family to donate used drinking straws for this project. Again, please don’t buy plastic straws. That would make me sad. Click here to learn how to reduce plastic straw waste.

Make sure the straws:

  • Don’t have cracks
  • Are clean and dry
  • Are about the same size in diameter and length
Recycled Crafts
Make sure the straws are: clean, dry, not cracked, and about the same size in length and width.

Step 2: Fold the Straws

  1. Press the straws flat by running your finger along them on a hard surface.
  2. Align them as seen in the photo below.
  3. Follow the folds as seen in the pictures below. I used straws of varying colors so it would be easy to see the folds. 
  4. Tips: Try to find two different colored straws to learn with. You will always fold the straw on the right for each step. Most steps follow an over/under or under/over pattern.
  5. Below are photo instructions. Click here for video instructions.
Crafts From Straws
Flatten the straws and fold them like this.
Recycled Hair Accessories
Fold the red straw on the right over the pink straw to get this configuration.
How To Fold A Heart With Straws
From the previous photo, take the pink straw on the right and fold it over the red and under the pink to get this configuration.
Recycled Hair Accessories
From the previous photo, take the red straw on the right and fold it over the straws, but under the red straw on the left to get the configuration seen here.
This is where the heart is going to make its bottom point. You will still fold from the right side, but this time, you are folding it behind the configuration, wrapping it around the other straw. Once behind, make the straw you are bending go over the red straw to get the configuration seen here.
Crafts With Trash
Fold the straw on the right in the same way as you did the last - under/behind and over.
From the previous photo, fold the red straw on the right over the pink and under the red to get the configuration seen here. (I turned the heart clockwise. Sorry! Hope I didn't confuse you!)
Recycled Hair Accessories
From the previous photo, take the pink straw on the right and fold it over the red and under the pink. You're almost done!
Recycled Hair Accessories
Fold the red straw on the right down to keep it out of the way. Take the longer red straw next to it and fold it down and into the fold as seen in the photo. It will be a tight squeeze!
Crafts With Trash
Pull the red straw through the fold tightly as seen here. Your heart will not unfold now! Fold and crease the straws along the lines of the heart, so you can see where you need to cut them.
Pull the long red straw out of the fold to unfold the heart partially. Cut the tips of the straws where you folded and creased them in the previous step. (You don't have to unfold the heart to make the cuts, but it helps to make them more precise and pretty looking.)
Recycled Hair Accessories
Re-fold the heart and stick a bobby pin through the fold as seen in the picture below. You're done!
Recycled Hair Accessories
Enjoy your recycled hair accessories! (To make the double hearts, I used black straws with a smaller diameter and sewed them on top of the bigger hair hearts.)
Recycled Hair Accessories
Practice makes perfect! Fold enough of these and you'll be able to do it in your sleep!
Recycled Hair Accessories

Thanks for Reading!

If you found the photo instructions to be too difficult, click here for video instructions.

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Want more recycled crafts? Learn how to make bracelets from potato chip bags here!

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