I recently completed this sweet boho bag for a client who is giving it to her daughter. I was given a onesie, a maternity top, a youth dress and some denim squares leftover from a quilt I had made her.
I love this bag for so many reasons. First, the memories. Second, it seems when you make this bag with patchwork squares, anything goes and anything seems to work together!
One of the denim blocks had a pocket so I used that as the inside pocket.
Some of my friends wanted to know if there is a pattern, so I’m sharing details of the pattern I used and some of the details I used. It’s not a step-by-step tutorial, but I hope that you will be able to make a bag of your own and I’d be happy to answer any questions you may have.
First, you can take a look at previous examples of what I’ve made here and here.
Then, the tutorial I used is here in Part 1 and Part 2. There is also a pattern that is very similar here.
Notes:
- Notice that the strap is at the center of the piece. So when you sew the two pieces together, that seam will become the center of the bag.
- Also remember this when you sew the oval bottom piece. The narrow sides of the bottom piece will line up with the straps. (I sewed the bottom on incorrectly one time. Thank goodness for seam rippers!)
- I have made various length of straps. This current strap is quite long. But the example down below with the purple is shorter. Play around with the length if you wish.
- I use 6.5″ blocks. Because I work with garments, I interface the blocks if they seem flimsy. It’s easiest to sew the long set of strap blocks first and then the side blocks. In the photo above you can see that I used 6 blocks in the center, at then two on either side.
- I cut the sewn pieces to the shape of the pattern. This involves rounding the edges before the strap. And then I underline it with flannel or thin batting. You can quilt the squares if you would like. I usually just sew around the outer edge to hold the two layers together.
- If you follow my sizing, you will note that my bags are two blocks high. This is slightly lower than the dimensions in the tutorial. If you want a deeper bag, then add a third block. If you look at the last two photos, you will see I added another block (so that the main part of the bag is 3 x 3). Most of that was cut off, but it fits into the given pattern better.
- Once you have the quilted side, you can cut two lining pieces. I usually use sweatshirt fleece because I have a lot of that in my studio.
- It gets a little tricky next. The two tutorials above give two different ways to do it. You will sew each side of the bag to a lining piece. Only along the straps. Trim curves and turn inside out. And then you will sew the sides of the bag and lining together at once.
- Finally, you will sew the base to the bag, the base to the lining and leave a space for turning inside out. I try to use a sturdy fabric for the base – denim or even just the sweatshirt fleece.
- The straps are done differently as well. With the thick linings that I use, it is too hard to sew the straps together continuously and then turn inside out. I would use the method of placing one side into the other. You can also not sew the straps to the top and then sew the two sides together. You can close them up when you top stitch.
I know this is a wordy DIY, but this is the kind of project you have to dive into. You will probably make some mistakes along the way but those are easily fixed. You could also practice it on two pieces of fabric without batting just to get the basic construction method.
