Tarpaulin upcycling: which products are made from tarpaulins and roll-ups

Tarpaulins and roll-ups end up in the same storeroom after campaigns and trade fairs, but technically they are two different materials. Which products are possible depends above all on the material thickness.

The difference between tarpaulin and roll-up

Tarpaulins are usually heavy PVC fabrics, waterproof, tear-resistant and made for permanent outdoor use. Construction fence banners and vehicle tarpaulins fall into this category.

Roll-up banners are considerably thinner, because they have to roll up into a cassette. Often they are coated film or Blockout material with an opaque intermediate layer. They take less punishment, but can be cut more precisely and more tightly. The material guide on Mesh, Blockout or PVC explains how to tell the individual banner types apart.

What is made from heavy tarpaulins

Because the material takes the strain, tarpaulins are suitable for products that are used every day: rucksacks, Messenger Bags, Dufflebags, belt bags, Moonbags. Laptop sleeves work well too, because the material is protective in itself.

The side effect: signs of use remain visible. You can see that on a tarpaulin that hung on a construction fence for two years, and it makes the product interesting.

What is made from roll-ups

Roll-up material is too thin for load-bearing structures such as rucksacks. It does allow smaller products to be made in large numbers: toiletry bags, clutches, pencil cases, keyrings, key pouches and Cardholders.

Because roll-ups are almost always printed over the full surface, interesting details come out of the cutting. Every piece shows a different section of the image. The overview with twenty product ideas from old advertising banners sets out which products are an option overall and how many of them a square metre yields.

When the two end up in the same place

There is rarely only one of the two in the storeroom. Usually it is a mixture of banners, tarpaulins, flags and roll-ups from several years.

That is not a disadvantage. We sort by thickness and printed image and match the right product to each type. The heavy part becomes the large bags, the thin part the give-aways. That way less is left over than if everything is treated the same.

Soiled material from outdoor use

Tarpaulins that hung outside for a long time are rarely clean. We take care of sorting, checking and cleaning. We need to know the condition in advance, because it feeds into the costing.