I’m bagging the fish bag yet again. Sigh. It isn’t personal, Fishie. There are not enough hours in my days (I think I’ve just heard shouts of ‘ditto’ from all round the globe). We’ll try to get you sorted for the next weekend trip to London. (Yikes. That’s this coming Friday). I have trimmed it down to the size I think it needs to be, so that’s something.
View A is my go-to bag.
I made the first one out of scraps from this project -
- a super king mattress quartered and covered with these two fabrics. Stacked two by two and stuck into a nook in the office, it turns that room into a single guest room. It looks great against the birch tree mural there in the nook.
I digress.
Others have been made — sometimes with bought (!!!) fabric — for all sorts of people. Using denim for the bottom of the bag OR the straps/top band is a good way to stretch a piece of fabric you want to use but don’t have enough of to make the whole bag in it. (Please don’t call the grammar police – just read that sentence again). I am quite fond of using posh Tana Lawn and old worn out denim together. Gotta love that contrast. In my Scrap Craft classes at Liberty’s old Sewing School I would suggest this and get shocked looks from some of my students. If I remember right the Fabric Bowls in my book (see the ‘About my Book page on this blog) use this combo.
Train of thought…back to the depot….
I need/needed a version of this for a specific reason. It needs/needed to go with the choice of clothing for said reason. (Can’t tell you what it is/was. I’d have to kill you). An item in the re-refashion box was the perfect color and pattern. Yes: I have refashion boxes AND re-refashion boxes. When I have a morning of organizing the craft room, I have a morning of organizing the craft room.
I have not worn that wrap skirt since we left HK. I often wore that robin’s egg blue Gap top from the last post with this Death Fabric skirt. Actually, I’ve made lots of things from this New Look pattern over the years.
(For heaven’s sake, IWOM: keep on topic!).
I did not take the skirt to pieces – I simply cut what I needed from the bottom part so that I could just re-hem it as a short above the knee skirt that I can use on our trip to Asia next summer. A belt made from the same fabric did for the two straps.
The pattern calls for one large pocket on one side of the lining, but I made two pockets for the other side as well on my first bag using this pattern. That large pocket looked really large, so before assembling the bag and lining I stitched two lines down each side for pens/pencils.
After carrying around the original for a bit, I started making notes on the sort of things that might be useful in future incarnations. A strap with a hook for keys, buckles on the straps to make them adjustable and some proper inner zipped pockets have gone into the others that I’ve made for gifts. One was a vinyl tablecloth in its first life which makes it waterproof. I could use one of those myself.
I didn’t have time to fuss with zip or flap pockets for the lining on this bag so made snug pockets to order. The pattern calls for interfacing the bag lining and band facing but the fabric is quite a soft weave so I used some medium weight on both the bag and pockets. I used interfacing scraps to reinforce just the bottoms of the inside pockets.
If you are making one of these, before you get too excited you need to make sure your pockets are the size you need. (One of these had to be re-made). And once you choose the location, move them up a little and in from the edge a little. Trust me. You’ll be happy you did.
You can put a pocket on a pocket if you like
and if you are going to include a hook on a tab for keys or the like do sew it into the band facing for strength.
All the pockets were designed around the items I need/needed to bring with me. Didn’t/don’t need the case for the sunglasses, the mobile pocket holds/held the thing nice and snug and away from the other stuff in the bag and that pocket in a pocket was/will be useful for holding my travelling tape measure. I over-pulled a cheap freebie tape measure to the point where it would no longer retract so cut it from the holder and keep it in whatever bag I take on my travels. Can’t tell you the number of non-fabric related incidents for which it has been useful.
I was surprised not to have a more interesting button in the stash
but I may find/may have found something better on my travels.
IWOM. It isn’t just an online name….
I was immediately drawn to the pictures of the quartered mattress (what a great spacesaver for a guestroom!) and the mural (stunning. Is it sewn? painted?) More details on both please!
After two years of sleeping on rock hard mattresses during the Hong Kong assignment, we discovered that our mattress back home was far too soft. I thought the old one might be useful for something and kept it after the new one arrived, but when you google ‘how to recycle a matress’ all you get is how to break it down to component parts. For a while I thought it might become some low seating for the conservatory but I’d picked up enough odds and ends of furniture to remake and what I really needed was extra sleeping spaces.
I did have a step by on my main blog which more or less showed the four bits cut, me taking a row of coils out so I could pleat over and sew new sides to the two resulting raw edges of each piece from the existing cover on the mattress then how I covered the parts with those two fabrics, but those were some of the mysterious disappearing pix from earlier this year so unfortunately the visuals are lost to us.
To hold the four pieces into a slightly off standard size single bed, I cut down an extra deep double bed pad and remade it so that it holds the four pieces together snuggly within that nook. I have a plan in my head for a simple sort of headboard that can slot in against the wall so that there would be a shelf for a clock or place to hook a reading light but since it was only my six year old nephew who has slept there he does not need either for a few more years! It is on the B List (with dozens of other projects…).
As for the birch tree mural, simple birch tree shapes were drawn on a plain white wall and then the background was painted black. I seem to remember googling for ideas for a tree mural and got that link that just shows you pictures of things people have tagged as ‘tree mural’, some of which will have a link to the blog or site with details.
Hope that helps.
IWOM