Bag Sewing Projects

 

After I started the wristlets projects, I found many free online bag tutorials which were not as difficult to follow as I thought. With so many scrap curtain fabrics that my ex-classmate,Cecelia gave me after she shutdown her curtain fabric shop, I decided to fully utilize them. Instead of making more small wristlet and phone bags, it was time for me to take the challenge of making bigger bags.

2014 Wristlet collections

I am really not a handbag person as I seldom wear handbag to work or even for shopping. Because of this, the likes of branded handbags such as Gucci, Prada, LV etc. were never in my “must have” list. I am ok to settle with any bag as long as it is functional. These online DIY bag patterns are functional and pretty. They are great for own use and also great as gifts to give away.

The following bag collections are the results of the many weekends that I spent since end of last year. Whenever I was not into baking, these sewing projects took place.

Most of these bags were no longer with me, except for the following three bags, which I just couldn’t give them up due to their nice fabric pattern.

Pleated bag by U- handbag

My favorite evening bag, Rosette round handle bag

and this latest collection Diana Hobo bag

The following bags were gifts that I gave away to relatives, friends and colleagues for various functions such as New Year, new born and farewell.

These were diaper bags for my Finance team members. You can get the free diaper bag tutorial from here

New year bag for my second Sister-in-law, Phoebe Bag pattern by Rebeka Lambert.

Farewell gift to my ex-IT staff, round wooden handle tote bag.

The latest hobo bag to my ex-Finance member.

These bags may not be made from fancy expensive material, but every bag made was a limited edition as they never shared the same bag and fabric patterns. For all the bags that I gave away, I hope the new owners would cherish them dearly and whenever they used it, I would be in their thoughts.

Or maybe I should sign off my master pieces by making a small embroidery to be sewed inside as my own brand.

DIY Wristlet Purse

Making your own limited edition

It has been a while since I last worked on any new sewing project. With the long Raya break at home, I reckoned it’s best to occupy the time to stock up my homemade gift buffer stock. I was hoping to make something useful other than household items.

Nowadays, wristlet purse is getting trendier. It is super versatile because you can use it as a replacement for bulky handbag which may not be so convenient to carry around to run short errands, office lunch outing at crowded eatery shops or even those disco nights where dancing is the prime agenda rather than keeping an eye of your oversized handbag. The wristlet can easily fit basic necessities, including ID, mobile phone, credit cards, lip gloss and cash and is small enough to use as a wallet in bigger handbags.

I seldom carry handbags to work. I used to have one self-made wristlet to take out during lunch hour which was big enough to store my wallet, hand phone, tissue, lipstick and car keys. Once, during a lunch outing with my boss, he saw the wristlet I carried and acknowledged it was much safer to carry such tiny handbag with short strap around hand than a big handbag. He later shared his wife’s unpleasant bag snatching theft experience and wanted to recommend his wife to get one too. This suggestion has prompted me to make more to share with my lady friends and relatives.

Shared below are some of the works I finished during the first 2 days of Raya break. Coach wristlet too expensive? Why not making your own ?

Not only cost saving but most important limited edition!

 

Do you like these Bow Clutch Wristlets ? You can get the free DIY tutorial here.

To add some variation to the bow clutch, I added a cloth rosette to it. I learnt to make these rosette via YouTube.

Transform placemat into a trendy clutch wristlet with magnetic button

Simple lining zipper wristlet

I spent longer time in making this little half circle purse because I hand sewn the zipper. You can get this free tutorial here

This wristlet adapted from Garden Party Wristlet - Designed by Keyka Lou. I couldn’t locate any free pattern online, so I spent hours in trial and error to get this up.

My 1st Project Runway

Barbie Fashion Project Runway

During the school holidays last December, my niece in Penang, Kyra came to me saying that her mommy (my sister Cindy) told her that I was good at sewing and asked that I make some new clothes for her Barbie dolls. How could I possibly reject an adorable 7 years old’s request? So, I accepted her request and that gave birth to my 1st ever Barbie Fashion project runway!

Like most girls , I often played dressing up dolls in my childhood days, but never a Barbie.  Barbie seemed to become popular only after my “time”.  At my tender age, the popular dressing up doll games was paper dolls, not this type of sexy plastic doll.  I guess some of you ladies would know what this paper doll game was about. Yes, it was a paper game made of A4 size thin cardboard, with a printed dolly girl figure and other colourful and fashionable dresses with tab and pre-cut tearing line. To play, we just had to press on the tear line to detach the doll and dresses. To dress the doll, the tab of the dress was folded and fixed on to the paper doll.  I still could remember that I used to design new paper dresses for these dolls from my own cardboard. Now with Barbie, instead of paper, I used scrap cloth that I salvaged. 

At first I did not obtain the right measurement from the Barbie doll. I did online search for Barbie free fashion templates and downloaded those as sample. However after making a few dresses,  it seemed very difficult for me to get the measurement right unless I had a doll to try on. I asked around my lady colleagues to see if any of them had daughters who had an extra Barbie doll to loan to me for this project. I managed to get one from a co-worker whose daughter had more than 10 Barbie dolls and wouldn’t mind to lend me one of her least favourites.

I took a few weekends and some late nights to come up with the following collection. I tried rushing to complete them in order to bring them to my niece during the Chinese New Year holidays for her to dress her Barbie with new clothes to celebrate New Year too.

I must say, thanks to this project, it brought back many of my happy childhood doll playing memories. Not only I got to fulfil my fashion designing dream by coming up with series of fashion to dress up her Barbie dolls, I got to experience playing Barbie which was not available back in my time.

Shared below were my experimental Barbie Fashion collection.

Elegant Evening Gowns

One dress 2 ways
My own design gowns, with scarf  and hair accessories.
Casual Wears
Matched with bags, scarf and hat.

 Sexy hot bikini swim suits
Using stretchable fabric recycled from my evening dress, after I had shortened the dress into mini skirt.


Kyra and her Barbie dolls performing Chinese New Year Barbie Fashion Show



The Project Runway Models


Kyra and her models enjoying high tea