Loose Ends Project

The Loose Ends Project is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organisation started in 2022 to help finish fibre arts projects started by people who cannot do so themselves because of illness or death.^[1][2][3]

Loose Ends Project

Established	2022
Founders	Masey Kaplan Jen Simonic
Type	nonprofit
Field	textile arts
Website	https://looseends.org/

Background

An unfinished blanket with many loose ends

Masey Kaplan and Jen Simonic started the Loose Ends Project in September 2022 to support grieving people.^[4][2][5] Both of them knit, and both have been asked in the past to finish items left by deceased relatives of their friends.^[4][6] The idea for the project came to them at the Carnegie Mellon University "tartans" class reunion when they were presented with a bag of crafting supplies left from their friend's mother who passed away, including two unfinished crochet blankets.^[6][1][7][8] Kaplan also says that another inspiration was her maker's journal where she describes the designs and composition of her projects.^[4]

At first, the authors advertised their project by putting flyers in cafés.^[3] Jo-Ann Stores craft retail chain made donations to the Loose Ends Project, and in Februaries 2022−2024, they ran a campaign of donating the change that buyers agreed to "round up".^[6][9][10] The money from this sponsorship allowed Kaplan and Simonic to work on their non-profit full time and hire a part-time worker.^[11] The Loose Ends Project received the Interweave Top 20 Awards in 2023.^[10]

Process

The project finds volunteer "finishers" for handmade projects.^[4] As of 2025, there are over 28,000 volunteers registered in 65 countries, with skills such as knitting, crochet, embroidery, rug-making, tatting and quilting.^[9][3][11] The volunteers provide their location, contact details and interests; they work for free, except for postage fees, which have to be paid if there are no local volunteers available.^[4][2][6] Kaplan and Simonic use a spreadsheet to match finishers and projects.^[2] They say that the number of volunteers greatly surpasses the amount of work that needs to be done: in 2024, there were over 2,500 projects completed, or about 1 project per 12 registered volunteers.^[12][3][9]

Project owners known as ("holders") provide pictures and information about the work and a short biography of the original author.^[12][9] They usually send finishers the project by mail along with the materials and patterns, if available; the finisher sends it back once they are done.^[6][13] Volunteers often mark the place where they have started working on the item to allow the recipients to identify parts made by the original author.^[4][2] For projects without patterns, finishers have to make design choices, and even modify the item if the recipient has already grown out of it.^[14] Sometimes finishers go beyond just completing the project. For example, one finisher learned how to dye yarn while another hired a truck to transport bulky weaving equipment.^[15] Kaplan and Simonic try to match people who live next to each other, hoping that it might start a friendship in the crafting community.^[3]