Reusable cutlery roll

In my ongoing efforts to reduce my personal plastic waste, I try to carry reusable cutlery with me in my backpack. I’m often out and about with the dogs, and it’s not uncommon for me to buy a smoothie, coffee, or lunch on my travels. Whilst a lot of companies have cottoned onto the plastic waste that comes with take out food, there are still notable brands who offer plastic forks and spoons to their customers. Some have tried to go green, by offering wooden cutlery, but these obviously still take resources to produce, transport, and dispose of appropriately. I suspect a lot of these wooden spoons end up in landfill, where they won’t do as much harm as plastic, but still represent a waste of carbon.

Enter the reusable cutlery roll. I made myself one of these a few years ago, using deadstock green waxed fabric, an old leather belt and some turtle print cotton Andrew brought back from San Francisco for me.  I had a set of camping cutlery and a reusable straw and used this little roll for around 4 years, until it was lost in the Great Van Theft of March 2023. It makes me sad to think of it now, maybe being used by baddies who stole the van, or more likely dumped with all our camping possessions at the side of the motorway as they sped away into the night with our beloved Turtle. Maybe it taught the bad guys the value of reusable cutlery?

The second iteration I made for a friend, after he helped me set up my now-dormant YouTube channel. Having seen my version, he requested one as a thank you present. I made his using the same green waxed fabric, but some stash gingham cotton for the lining and a remnant of navy webbing for the closure. The joy of this project is how simple it is, and how few notions you need. You can make it with two rectangles of fabric, with the closure tie sandwiched in the middle. Then fold up around one third of the rectangle to form the pockets for the cutlery and sew your channels in whatever size you require. I made myself a rough pattern out of brown paper, just for future reference and tweaking, and I’m so glad I did. It saves me the hassle of working out the measurements each time.

After an appropriate period of mourning for the Turtle campervan and lost cutlery roll (amongst many other beloved possessions), I decided this summer the time had come to make a new one. I bought a length of deadstock waxed burgundy cotton from ArkDefo, with the intent to make a waxed coat. I cooled on that idea, and instead used the fabric for an apron (soon to be blogged) and this cutlery roll. As a side note, this is a great reason to have a core colour palette, so if your plans change, the colour still applies to your wardrobe.

This fabric is beautiful to work with, thick and gorgeous quality. I’ve not worked with wet waxed cotton before, so the slight oiliness was a bit of a surprise. It wears off over time though, and the resultant material is smooth to the touch, with no hint of oil left. You have to line it with special lining fabric (essentially a different type of cotton), which I bought as a set with the waxed cotton. I couldn’t chose the colour of the lining and the option that came with the burgundy wax was a salmon pink colour, which is not in my chosen colour palette. 

Luckily, I have some beautiful vintage kimono cotton in my stash, gifted to me by a friend who lived in Japan in the 1980s. After seeing someone on Instagram talk about quilting onto the lining fabric, I followed suit. I quilted the lining fabric to my kimono fabric, following the diagonal lines between the white pattern as a guide, and then treated that piece as a single layer of fabric. I love the weight and heft it gives to this little roll, it makes it feel very substantial.

I added a remnant cork label, embossed with the Craft & Thrift three trees, and used my Hulk press to add a brass stud fastener. The cutlery was all sourced from the charity shop (£1.20, score!), I sewed a cotton napkin for the napkin pocket, and added reusable straws from my kitchen drawers. I was inspired by Sew Love NZ, after hearing her on Check your Thread podcast, and her adorably titled ‘Snackage Packages’, to alter my basic rectangle pattern. Her cutlery rolls have additional pockets for napkins and a curved edge, to better roll and close. If you don’t want to make your own, definitely check out her designs, and perhaps buy one from her.

With multiple layers of pockets in this version, it was a bit of trial and error, to sew them in the right order, and I’m not gonna lie, I ripped out and resewed several seams as I went. In time, I want to go back and write down the correct order to sew these in, to maximise efficiency and minimise changing thread colour on the sewing machine.Maybe I’ll publish it as a little pattern some time in the future? Regardless, this little cutlery roll, in whatever form you decide to sew it, would make an excellent gift. You can use remnant fabric from your stash and thrift the cutlery to go inside. A gift and an encouragement to refuse plastic cutlery, all in one!