The GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS™ title for the largest ball of lint!

Before we could get the ball rolling, we first had to assess the rules. In order to be considered for an official record title, our lint ball would have to weigh in at over 99lbs, be made entirely of lint, and be able to maintain its ball shape. The first two were easy. The 1300 pounds of lint was dried and safely stored in our shipping container. During this process, we also removed all the socks (there were so many socks!), licenses, toys, and other personal items that had been trapped in the lint.

Now it came down to the curveball - taking all this loose lint and turning it into a compact ball. Over the course of this process, we used some of the lint to complete several practice runs that would showcase just how difficult this challenge was going to be. After a few failed attempts, we had the idea to create a special box with curved sides that the lint could be compressed into and shaped. Once in the box, several grown adults would have to put a large board over top of the lint and jump. When all was said and done, between removing all the non-lint items, performing multiple practice tests, and losing some lint in the shaping process, the 1300lbs of lint turned into a record setting, 690-pound ball of lint!

Then the big day rolled around, September 19th, 2019, we flew an official GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS adjudicator from New York to Farmington Hills, Michigan to witness our attempt. We also had to have a fiber expert and a surveyor on site as experts to certify the lint was from clothing fibers and to measure the size of the ball of lint. We worked with the Farmington Hills fire department to secure a location to assemble the ball of lint and to light it on fire. The ball was assembled, measured, weighed on a crane, and it smashed the record. Our ball of lint officially measured in at 19 feet 6 inches in circumference, a massive 4 feet 4 inches tall, and weighed 690 pounds - an official GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS title!