Leggi questo post in: Italiano
I was really excited to be one of the testers of my friend Irene from Serger Pepper‘s latest pattern, the hands-free asymmetrical bag.* I’ve been using this Colombian mochila for nearly five years and it’s starting to fall apart. Plus the wool strap bothers my exposed skin in the summer. I’d been wanting a new bag for a while that I could use in the summer, but it had to be a bag with an across-the-chest strap because I generally need all the hands I can get!
I sewed the bag from these three old pairs of pants. The brown pair on the left was ripping apart at the side seams. The two other pairs were very well-used maternity pants (and you can see the tutorial for the maternity jeans here) that were also falling apart.
You may have noticed this bag making appearances in my Me-Made-May ’14 pictures, but let me show you it up close and personal. Isn’t the curved stripe design on this bag amazing? Sewing those curves is more complicated than it looks, but Irene gave really good tips on doing it well, so it ended up being relatively simple.
Under the flap is an optional handy-dandy zipper pocket which fits my little sewing ideas notebook perfectly (because you know how inspiration will always strike when you’re on the street checking out other people and shop windows!). The pants legs weren’t wide enough to get in some of the larger pieces in without incorporating a side seam. Here you can see a side seam going across the front of the bag, but it gets hidden behind the flat and doesn’t bother me in the slightest.
Check out all this awesome storage space inside! There is the option to add a second inner zipper pocket and customizable open pockets. I made my pockets to perfectly fit my phone, a pen and a couple of cloth hankies. I put my keys, lip gloss and hand sanitizer in the inside zipper pocket.
There’s also a side pocket, but I made it a little too tight to fit much in it. However I live near Naples, Italy, where you need to be very careful about pickpockets, so I generally never put anything in outside pockets anyway. Interested in the pattern? Then grab it up at the Serger Pepper shop!*
*This post contains affiliate links.
**edited 13/09/14
Question of the day: Do you prefer bags with handles or bags with shoulder straps?
Bags with handles are awfully cute, but I really can’t handle (ohhh, bad joke) not having a strap because I always need my hands for dealing with my children, holding something or anything else. Plus, if I don’t have the bag hanging on to me somehow, there’s a pretty good chance that I’ll leave it somewhere!
Just AMASING !!! This pattern seams extra.
Thanks, Liochka!
Very cute! I like bags with straps but since they have a tendency to dig into my shoulder, I want to make one with foam on the inside of the straps. Years ago I bought a Daisy Kingdom kit for a back pack and started it. It had foam in the straps. I still have it and want to incorporate the idea into a purse. Like a lot of Moms, I sometimes have a tendency to carry too much in my purse, which weighs it down, causing the weight on the shoulders, but the foam absorbs it and distributes it more evenly so that it doesn’t pinch you.
Rosemary, I know exactly what you mean about carrying around a heavy bag! Putting foam in the strap is a great solution. So far I haven’t had problems with this bag because the strap is relatively wide, but I might take your advice and put some foam in any future bag straps!