I made a jute front door mat you guys! It turned out so cute, I may need to make more! I love projects like this...it was easy and affordable, anyone can recreate this at home and make it themselves. No sewing involved, all you need are a few supplies from a dollar store and your own home, and you too can make one just like this.
I love the warm textural addition it has made to our front entry. I was very inspired to make this while I was brainstorming a makeover for my front porch area. I had already painted my front door white and the front concrete steps a pretty dark grey, so I knew adding a warm rug would be the perfect touch to this area!
Some of you may be thinking, why are you making this?? Why not just buy one? Well that's a great question. This would cost about $10-$20 to make depending on where you find your jute cord and mat. I got all of my supplies at the Dollarama minus the mat. You could maybe find a jute door mat for around the same price already made, but I will say, not everyone lives in a place that has good stores nearby. Yes, there is online shopping, but not everyone is comfortable with online shopping and if you're anything like me, you need to see and feel something before you commit to buying it. So I guess this post if you guys, or anyone really that likes to get their craft on as much as I do.
Creating is therapy for me, and the more I create pretty things the more rewarding it feels every time.
So lets get started you guys,
Enjoy!
Supplies Needed:
Jute Twine (this is thinner than the cord) Dollar Tree, Dollarama, Hardware stores.
Strong Thread
Strong Needle
Old thin mat you got laying around, preferably one with a rubber bottom and meant for outdoors.
Hot Glue Gun
Scissors
So first thing I did was decide how big of a mat I would want for my front door. I took a 3x5 mat I had from Walmart and just cut it down the middle in half.
Next thing I did was braid! I braided a lot....it was a bit of work I guess, but to me it never feels like "work" but more like playing. For each braid, I cut 9 pieces of jute cord to 45" long. I then grabbed a small pieces of jute twine and tied the 9 pieces together on one end. Then I sectioned the 9 pieces into 3 sections of 3. I wrapped it around the top of a mug rack, then just started braiding! Use whatever works for you to help you braid. Just use something that you can easily remove it from in the end.
I should note that for each braid, I made sure to tie my ends with about 2-3" of the cord left unfinished. This will create a nice fringe look to the edge of your mat if that's something you would like. .
In total I braided 23 braids to cover my mat. Doing a quick calculation, I believe the total of Jute cord I used to make this mat was about 258 yards. Sounds like a lot, but it doesn't appear that way because each braid had 9 strings.
To attach the braids, the first step I did was stitch along the edge of the mat into the just twine knotted ends. I didn't really do any fancy stitch, I just had some strong thread and needle and just sewed through the back of the mat that had threads and into the back of the end braids. I did this to both ends of the mat. I hope this is making sense??
At first I used a product called Liquid Nails for Small Projects to attach the braids. I read the product details and it said it could be used on canvas and paper, so to me it seemed like just what I needed to attach it them keep it down without any lifting. Unfortunately I did find it wasn't sticky enough for my liking.
So as I started to run out of the Liquid Nails I turned to my good ol' hot glue gun and reinforced all my braids with the hot glue and finished them all off. All I did was lift up each braid and run a long application of the hot glue under each section then with my hand press firmly to make sure the hot glue really stuck to both the mat and underside of the braids. I feel very confident those braids ain't budging with the hot glue and I kinda wish in hind sight that I just used that to begin with. Have you ever tried to remove hot glue from fabric before?? Yeah....it isn't going anywhere!
I did use clamps on some of the ends of the braids to help pull the braids flat down and stretch across nicely. I found some of my braids were a tad short for some reason, so by using the clamps it was really able to help pull them to be longer and hold them down while the glue dried.
The only thing I had left to do was trim up the fringes on each end to even them all out and give it a nice polished look.
This is the cutest and most unique entry mat! What I also love so much about this project is how you can customize it to make your own size! Some entry mats are too small I find, so by creating your own you can go bigger than the standard mat and make a beautilful impression to your guests. I also think it doesn't look handmade, to me it looks like it came from Target or Amazon!
Hope you enjoyed this easy project and share your creations as always with me on Instagram!
Have a wonderful day!
Dale