Category Archives: Accessories

241 tote

241 tote

This week, I’ve been mostly bag-makin’. With, I’d fairly say, mixed success. The idea of making a new bag has been hovering around my to-sew list for a while. While I’m totally not a bag-obsessive type of person (I own exactly one everyday bag at a time and wear it into the ground) it’s such a pain to find one I like when the time to replace it comes that the idea to sew my own seemed kind of obvious. I’ve been slowly beavering away inspiration and pattern and fabric options. Here’s some of that pinspiration (click through to the post to see the pins below if you’re in a reader):



In the end I chose the Noodlehead 241 tote pattern in grey faux leather. It’s the second Noodlehead bag pattern I’ve made – my mum is still toting her Poolside everywhere. The pattern is called 241 because you can either include the zipped front pockets, or leave them off for a more straightforward sew. I liked the look of them so chose the harder route, but soon began to wish I hadn’t.

241 tote

My faux leather, while nice quality (it’s this imitation napa from My Fabrics) and easy to cut and sew, was a tricky one when it came to any step requiring pressing, such as making the strap or zip pocket openings. It melted at the mere sight of an iron, so I simply couldn’t get a crisp and neat press. In the end I shot it with steam from the lining side and clamped some heavy books on it for a while to help the shape ‘set’. You also can’t use pins because they’ll leave a permanent mark, so a lot of sticky tape was deployed. Hence those front zips look decidedly amateur with the lining poking out, unpicking marks left around one of them, and the zip tape openings showing at each end. Yucks.

241 tote

Maybe I’ll just wear it backwards with the plain side facing out all the time, ha ha, because otherwise I am fairly happy with it. I printed the pattern at 110% size to make it just a little larger, and I like that the base has darts which add some 3D roominess. It’s not included in the pattern, but I used this tutorial to make the strap adjustable in length. The rectangular brass rings and sliders are from Bobbin Girl.

241 tote

Construction was quite simple, zips and fabric issues aside. It’s bagged out like any normal lined bag – I used a Cotton and Steel print inside. It closes with a magnetic snap at the top.

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Here’s how it looks in use. To be honest even though I’m not 100% happy with the construction I will probably use it anyway since my previous bag is really tatty by now. I wouldn’t discount making the pattern again, but maybe in a friendlier fabric with more attention to detail on the zip insertion. I’m off to sew something way more fun now…

Indiesew: Noodlehead Poolside tote

Poolside tote

I was really pleased to be asked to join the Indiesew summer collection blog tour, and today’s the day to share my make. If haven’t seen it yet, Indiesew is like an indie pattern brand megastore, perfect for browsing tons of labels in one place, and all easily filtered by category. For my review of the collection I was allowed to pick three patterns, and I’ve actually made two of them already. This is the first, which is Noodlehead’s Poolside Tote.

poolside tote

What I especially like about Indiesew is they make up the garments in their own fabrics, so you get a different view than the photos released by the designer. They also have a great community so you can see how lots of other people have made up the patterns – it’s always really handy to see a pattern on lots of people and in a variety of fabrics to help visualise if you’d like it! Noodlehead’s blog has a lot of other fabric options for this tote too – I think the pattern works great for a city bag as well as ‘poolside’.

Poolside tote

I made the tote as a wee gift for my mum as she’s been after a roomy shopping tote and this fabric I found (Art Gallery Vines grey canvas) reminded me of her favourite Orla Kiely designs. 

Poolside tote

I used Minerva’s tan canvas for the handles and edge facing which is slightly thicker so seemed suitable to add some sturdiness. Nearly all of the pieces are interfaced per the instructions for more stability too. I like how the end result is structured yet squashy too – it’s comfortable to wear and incredibly roomy.

Poolside tote

So I really like how the bag turned out, but I realised early on that the process of sewing bags isn’t really my bag (ho). All the measuring, cutting and ironing takes twice as long as the actual stitching and was such a snoozefest. But the Poolside instructions were clear and easy to follow which did make it as painless as possible.

Poolside tote

It’s constructed a bit differently to how I’ve made lined bags before: usually I’d leave a lining corner open to turn it all right side out, but here it’s all assembled with the right sides out, and the little facing strip finishes the upper edge nicely.

Poolside tote

The only thing I changed was to leave off the keyring loop and to add a magnetic snap closure – the edge facing is a natural place to add a fastening. I just made sure to get the snaps in place before topstitching the facing down so the prongs are hidden inside. I also added a practical phone-sized interior slip pocket before constructing the lining.

Poolside tote

I used a jeans needle for all the construction to negotiate the thick fabric. I’m not mad pleased with my topstitching; it’s pretty wobbly and obvious looking even though I used my 1/4″ foot. I found it hard to keep it straight when dealing with multiple layers and manoeuvring the rather large bag under my machine.

Poolside tote
Poolside tote

It’s a bit of a prancing pony* situation though and I suspect it’d have looked worse if I ripped it out and tried to redo it. And my mum loves it and started using it immediately, which is the main thing!

*If you can’t see your mistakes from the back of a prancing pony, they don’t really matter. I think I took this from knitting legend Elizabeth Zimmermann.

The other stops on the Indiesew Blog Tour Schedule:

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Thanks again to Indiesew for sending me along the pattern! Be sure to go check out the whole summer collection, I think you could build a pretty sweet capsule wardrobe from it.