A DIY Burlap and Wire Laundry Hamper

For the past…ever…there’s been a big red plastic tub (with rope handles, super classy) in the bedroom in lieu of an actual clothes hamper. Finally…I made a DIY burlap and wire laundry hamper. Or a DIY wire basket. Or a burlap-lined hamper…thing. Whatever.

This is my version of it. The original tutorial is from Apartment Therapy and can be found here.

It’s easy peasy and costs less than buying a wicker hamper. It’s just a circle of wood (I spray-painted mine a cream color) with sturdy fencing wire wrapped around it, with casters on the bottom. You can stick a store-bought laundry bag inside, make one, or do what I did – throw a burlap coffee bag in there. I found the coffee bags at a liquidation store and have been sitting on them for months, not knowing what in the heck a person does with burlap coffee sacks.

The bag fit with room to spare, but then I washed it. (OMG the stench. Like a boot left out in the rain for 4 weeks. Yeesh.) It shrank quite a bit after that. The length was still good but it wouldn’t fit around the wire anymore, so I just cut a few inches down each side with a pair of scissors and folded the top over the edge of the hamper. I tied it down with some ribbon and called it a day.

The tutorial on Apartment Therapy gives excellent directions, and I had no trouble putting this together. Probably because I let my husband handle the difficult bits, like cutting the wire to length.

The only downside to this project is having to buy a roll of fencing. I’ve got hardware cloth, chicken wire, rabbit wire, and who knows what else all stuck in a shed, but nothing was sturdy enough for this project. It was around $25 for the wire and you only need a few feet of it. The extra wire will get used up eventually around here, but I wanted to give a heads-up that it was the most expensive part of this project and not everyone has a use for 20 feet of fencing.

Another project down, and now onto the next! (I don’t know what that is yet, but I’ll figure it out!)