Snakeskin Bag for me

Well I finished it! My very first bag - not that I needed anymore handbags but can you ever really have enough?

I thought I would choose a simple pattern for the first bag - this one was a freebie when I bought a baby shoe pattern from this site - http://ithinksew.com/ (no 31 Shouder Bag). It is one pattern piece cut twice for the exterior and twice for the lining and then the little flap piece. So I thought I couldn't go too wrong. I used a pellon interfacing which was quite thick and combined with the snakeskin print gives the bag texture .

The bag uses magnetic bag snaps to close and unfortunately every time I try to open the bag it is slightly ripping the linen lining it is attached to open - if anyone has any suggestions on how to lower the magnetic attraction I am listening ..... I installed the magnetic clip on the flap on the wrong side - it is supposed to be on the exterior fabric side and the lining becomes the exterior for the flap for a contrast - which would of course look a little better but once I had put that clip in there was no going back.

The only part of the bag I am not that keen on is the straps tie at the top and I find bags with tie straps really uncomfortable to wear. For this bag I am thinking of putting a button and buttonhole to attach them at the top. For the next one I think I would just sew them together before I turned it out.




I used a chocolate linen for the lining which I was going to use to make N some matching shorts as J (see earlier posts).

All up the bag took me about 3 hours to make and would be much quicker now I know what I am doing. And as it only uses about 70cm of each material it is pretty economical. I would definitely make it again. The website also gave me a free clutch pattern (no 45 clutch) so I am keen to see if I can use the scraps from this project to make that one.