Who knew you could make a fab little clutch using a tea cup saucer as a pattern? This project is the result of last week's Object Project challenge, and would be the perfect date to any summer wedding! Although, you may want to bring a man along as well, you know, to get your cake and such!
I used a light summer tweed and black and white damask, but you could certainly make it a little less formal by using lighter weight fabrics and fun prints. This project requires a little more hand sewing than my projects normally do, but I think the effort is certainly worth it! Now, let's make a bag, baby!
What you'll need...
1/4 yard lightweight tweed, 1/4 yard damask, 12" square of satin, 12" square of flannel, scissors, needle and thread, pen, magnetic snap closure, ribbon and covored button to embellish if desired
I used a tea cup saucer with a diameter of 6" as my pattern. If you don't have a tea saucer, try a small bowl or large coffee cup.
I drink alot of coffee! I once was thrilled to have found what I thought was the perfect coffee cup. When I brought it to the sales clerk, she informed me that it was, in fact, a pitcher! So, your coffee cups might not be quite as large as mine! Anyway...
1. Trace the saucer onto your fabric. You'll need 8 circles of tweed and 8 circles of the damask. Cut out the circles and pin a tweed circle to a damask circle, right sides facing. Repeat until you have 8 pairs of 2 circles pinned together.
Marking on tweed can be twicky.. er..tricky! Fabric pens sometimes won't do the job and normal ink pens tend to skip on the fibers. Try using an old lip liner you have lying around. The waxy consistency transfers quite smoothly to the tweed and you won't have to press hard, which can distort the shape of the fabric. Just be sure to wipe off your scissors when you're through!
2. Using a 3/8" seam, sew around each circle leaving about a one inch space for turning. Trim the seam allowances to 1/4" and turn right side out.
3.Press the circles flat and handstitch the turning space closed.
4. Fold each circle in a little less than half and pin. Put a few handstitches in the center to hold the fold.
5.Lay the circles out in groups of four, overlapping as shown.
6. Handstitch the circle units together to form the front and the back of the clutch. If you're using tweed, the fabric is very forgiving and will hide all of your stitches! If you choose to use cotton, just focus your stitches to the center, where you can cover them up with the ribbon.
7.Handstitch the front and the back of the bag together at the sides.
8. This is the point at which you can embellish the bag. I handstitched a black ribbon sash and a covered button to this bag. You could also try tassels, silver hardware, or maybe a fabric flower! Try one from my Mother's Day Corsage Tutorial!
9.If you're thinking, "this bag is lovely, but where will my things go?" Don't fret. Let's make the lining! Measure you're bag. It should be roughly 8" by 5". Fold the squares of satin and flannel in half and cut a 8" by 5" rectangle on the fold of each. Make sure right sides are facing and stitch up the sides of the flannel rectangle and the satin rectangle. Turn the flannel rectangle right-side-out and then slide it inside the satin rectangle. Pin around the top of the rectangles. Using a 3/8" seam, sew them together, leaving about a 1" space for turning. Reach inside, turn right-side out, and press. Handstitch the turning space closed. Add the magnetic snap closure and the lining is finished!
10. Now all you have to do is slip the lining into the outer bag and handstitch it in place around the top!
Hope you'll try this one out! Don't be intimidated be the handstitching! Never be afraid to put a stitch in and see if it looks right- that's what a seam ripper is for!
Now I'll be sending this little beauty off to Christine, the winner of the Object Project challenge. I certainly hate to see it go! I think I'll have to make one for myself!
Happy Stitching!
~Leigh Ann~
