Repurpose fabric sample books and make a tote bag!

hi everybody welcome to Katherine shows have you ever seen these big awesome books of sample fabrics that I'm interior designers use and upholsterers things like that companies are really quite happy to give these away because once it's out of style they're just storing it and they don't really want to see it go to waste either so my trains they've been really happy to give away lots of these um so if you're looking for something to make and sell an etsy or sell for a fundraiser it's pretty great to get your materials for free once they go out of season there's not much use for them as they are but with a couple little tricks we're gonna be able to turn this huge collection of fabric into some really cool projects so I'm excited to show you that first thing I made of them was this beautiful tote bag which is super useful and kind of cool I'm gonna show you how to take apart those books cuz that's a little bit of a struggle but we're gonna be able to take it all apart and use every bit of it to get that whole book apart you're going to need some cutting pliers oh and I'm also going to use a butter knife to help wrestle this book open with my butter knife I'm gonna pry this whole top part up and then pull off the two sides okay so now you can see we are left with these four gigantic staples and that's where the cutting pliers come in you might also want safety glasses here okay safety glasses whew there's also a glue holding everything together but the top layers is clear plastic which definitely has holds a lot of possibilities for us so then you can pull off the fabrics so now this whole stack of fabrics is yours to play with and there's so many beautiful ones in there some of them are kind of outdated for sure but most of them are beautiful and they all coordinate together which is so great first of all I'm going to show you how a great trick that I learned for another youtuber on how to get the paper off honestly sometimes I just leave it on for the extra stability in fact when I made this one I didn't even take the paper off and I kind of like that it's like got a little bit more stability because it's got some stiffness in there I think it's totally fine but this is such an awesome trick I need to show you to get this paper off we need to have a hot iron I want to have my iron-on cotton setting they all come with their fiber content labeled so this one is 100% cotton so I don't have to worry about melting my fabric but if it was anything that was out all synthetic I would just put a pressing cloth on top to protect this fabric while I work away the glue here that hot iron with steam is just going to start melting the glue away and then it just pulls right off like that that nice so I learned that trick from a youtuber called Daisy Nick and I'll link her video right here some of them are leaving bits of paper on and you know what I'm not even gonna worry about that that'll be fine and some are just not coming off at all and you know what that's fine too okay so this is what I've ended up with and this is what you're going to need I've got three pieces there are ten inches by 12 inches three there are ten inches by six inches those are going to make up the body of the bag and then from my pocket first of all look at that I got my logo digitized from my embroidery machine so I'm super excited about that that's what I'm going to end up doing for the pocket with one of the less beautiful fabrics as the lining of the pocket the pocket piece is 7 inches by 6 inches and then in the lining it's just 5 inches by 6 inches good I'm gonna need a lighter for melting the ends of the straps and this is probably propylene webbing and they're 20 inches long wax piece to draw with your matching thread and bobbin ruler and then about half a meter of fabric to line the whole thing with pins and an iron one thing I want to show you though is where the staples are they it's pretty big holes in the fabric this one I couldn't get the paper off at all but it's a good way to show you the staple holes I think that would show up as a whole so I'll be cutting off the tops of those so I've just stacked them all on top of each other with the staple holes all here and they actually it's surprising this difference in the size this one is from the smaller book so it's my smallest piece one is going to cut right there beside the oil yeah and I'm getting rid of all the staple the same so I'm going to try for the pocket to just put these two pieces right side together and sew across the top okay I'm immediately gonna turn that an edge stitch it my seam allowance is gonna come out that way it's facing apart or the lining of the pocket is gonna come up over the seam allowance and I'm just coming right back the opposite way without even having cut my threads yet and I want to make sure that my seam allowance stays going toward the facing this is under stitching and it's gonna keep everything flat and this is why the lining is a little bit sure this was 6 by 7 and this was 6 by 5 because I didn't want the top edge of the pocket to look like that right with that lining showing don't love that too much so it's gonna roll in that way now I think that'll be nicer okay so now I'm gonna put them together like this and I'm gonna sew and sew I want to come around the corner but I'm gonna leave a gap in the middle to be able to turn that right side out so making sure my bottom corners are lined up together okay a nice clean pivot at the corner and I don't want to go too far because this is quite stiff so I need a fairly big gap to be able to flip it right side out let us come to here and then hop right over and pivot before I flip it I need to trim off the extra fabric around these corners all of that seam allowance has to pack in there and it's too much so I'm going to be cutting off around the corner definitely be careful not to cut your stitch your last corner stitch but you want to get it smoothed off around there as you can so now looking this right-side out I kind of Jam my thumb right into that corner and push out that one Jim might come right in there okay okay thank you okay so I'm gonna leave my scissors closed up and I'm gonna push them into the corner there now I'm trying not to mash up that seam allowance into a ball I want it to be flat but I want it to be a nice pointy corner I can't have the iron too high because this is these are synthetic fabrics and they will melt up the cotton setting now that gap I'm just gonna leave that all tucked in what I want it to look like a nice straight line I'm just gonna make sure this is looking straight okay that'll do for the pocket I'm gonna put a top stitch across there I'm gonna have the edge right here which is at the 20 line which is our 3/4 of an inch and it's quite thick so I'm going slowly to make sure I don't break a needle slow again I'm going to be sewing these all together here and I'm just going to chain right into the next one and right into the next one see how much paper he left on this one I just gave up after a while I can cut the chain apart and then flip them and press them from the right side as well okay so now on this piece I want it centered not too close to the bottom because we're gonna be boxing the corners at the bottom so you know this side kind of wraps around it becomes the bottom of the bag so I think the boat there is good and centered here good so but five pins around I'm just gonna show those three sides now then while I'm at the machine I'm going to be putting the other panels on right sides together so that side flip it out and sew this side so there we go when I'm sewing on a pocket I like just so nice and close to the edge okay so that'll do for the pocket and then I'm gonna put these two together now I want to be able to match up that seam I'm gonna stab the pin through the seam on this side and make sure it comes out and the seam on that side back into that seam and back out of that seam so those are just nailed together and I'll do that on this side as well so you're kind of weaving the pin in through all the layers then when I get to this seam I just want to look underneath and make sure the seam on just staying open the way I pressed it otherwise it's gonna make a bit of a lump there my needles not gonna love this punching through this paper I'll definitely have to replace the needle after this project back at the iron and just pressing all these scenes open it and then press from the right side so this big quilt it to get a piece now is the body of the bag and now that we've got it sewn together I can measure exactly how tall and how wide this is to be able to cut the lining piece I'm gonna snip and tear off the selvage I never like to use the selvage because it's old and more tightly and makes your seam look puckery sew down one edge now just to measure like that a tear there and I know this fabric is just a little bit wider than the then my bag so I'm just gonna tear right across you get the proper link now I'm just comparing those and I need it to be right there so good long snipping I've just folded my piece in half and I'm gonna be able to just match up those top corners and sew down this side and pivot and come across the bottom so I'm gonna match up my top corners of the lining and on the side seam of the lining I have to leave a gap to turn the whole bag right side out later a little backpack there and then hop over at a few inches at least the width of your hand and then we can pivot we could also leave the gap in the bottom here or the side doesn't really matter as long as you've got a gap on the inside somewhere I'm gonna put the lining bag right over the pointy end of the ironing board so that I can press this seam open I can't really do the same thing on this one because well I can come down to there but I can't pivot and come across the bottom because we're gonna be refolding this to get that pocket in the center not on the side like this so I'm going to come down and come back to the end so once again I want to nail those seams together third theme now has to get Christopher Pitt in flats now for the bottom edge of the bag I need to find the center of this side and match the center here with the seam there you could either fold it in half or I could measure and that's nice I've got exactly nine inches so at four and a half inches there that's the point that I want to match up with that theme so that nicely centered now I'll be able to just sew across there and then we'll buck the corners checking those seam allowances underneath make sure they stay how you pressed up close what I mean this has to stay open don't let that seam allowance fold over okay so for boxing the corners it's probably easiest to show you on the lining because what we're gonna try to do is get this seam laying right on top of that seam and we want this flat don't let any extra folds happen in here that has to stay nicely flattened up like that let's do an inch and a half or four centimeters from the point I'm gonna put a pin right there and I'm going to sew a line that's perpendicular to this scene sewing right across there this one I'm gonna press a bit of a crease there just so I know I've got my triangle lined up right because the seam does not continue here so when I open up this seam I want that to be laying right on top of that crease same idea on the bag so what we're doing is basically you're grabbing the front and back and close those front and back away from each other to get this seam right in the middle of your triangle the triangle is even on both sides yeah so there's kind of a crease there that looks even nice and flat that triangle that we pinned make sure it goes in nice and flat on the back no extra folds the pin is where we want to be sewing perpendicular to this scene make sure the seam allowance stays open on the back so that it's nice and smooth come in for that pin perpendicular to this seam so I've got both banks own and they're both still inside out I'm going to leave the lining one inside out but I'm gonna take the outside bag and turn it right-side up good so I'll back looking kind of cool now we're ready to put the straps on this polypropylene webbing it frays so much if I just pulled that thread I could run around my whole house I'd have nothing left here okay so I've got my little lighter now you can go do this beside a sink I just have a little bowl of water in here just in case things get out of control but it's pretty easy so I'm gonna take all four ends of my polypropylene webbing and I'm gonna just melt those threads just melt it all in there be careful anytime you're using a flame and also the ends are hot obviously I just melted them so they're hot right now just give them a second to cool for placing the straps I found the middle of this center panel and I pinned it to the center back seam there so that this is all centered right then I'm going to take one of my polypropylene straps that I've melted the ends and make sure it's not twisted and then it goes hanging down like that which I know seems inside out and backwards but that's often how we fill it and I'm going to pin that just to the raw edge there and the seam over here and I'll do the same on the back right even with the other one I'll just pin it there and here now of course that's a point of tension when you're using this Bank so I'm going to sew back and forth across there a few times with a nice strong back tag and then we'll put the lining on just back tacking those straps so now this part might seem confusing but trust me this is how it works so this bag stays facing right side out the lining is inside out the lining has one side seam that's it so I want to find where the other side is and make a little snip there but mainly what I want is the center's so I'm going to bring my seam line over to little snip and then folding it in half I'll make a little notch here at the center front and center back so now I've got my center's marked this bag stays right side out and it goes inside the lining with the lining being inside out with the strap all tucked in and that Center not just gonna go to the center of the bag there pain together tuck the strap in on this side and it's that center back seam of the bag that's gonna go to my center back notch here and when I give that a tug that fits all together nicely so just four pins around the top should do it if you want more pins you certainly can and then I'm going to sew all the way around this circle and when I feel a strap there I think I'll do another set of back tacks good and now you remember that gap we left on the side or maybe you left it on the bottom either ways fine now you're gonna pull the whole bag out from that gap awesome now before I shove the lining in I like to press it around the top here and I can feel that the seam allowance is coming toward the lining and that's what I want now that we're at the iron let me warn you when I was making this one I on my final press and I was all done I took it to the iron and look what I did I totally melted the strap so I had to unpick it and replace that strap so while you're at the iron just be careful I do want it on a high setting because I want to be able to get a nice press at the top here but just be careful not to press your straps and melt them let's get the strap going toward the main bag I can feel underneath at the seam allowance it's coming down into the lining that's what we want it's like under pressing where we're pressing a facing or the lining to the inside and that'll keep it from rolling out now I'm going to push the whole lining inside the bag and get a nice edge at the top you could even put a pressing both right over the straps here so you don't have a disaster like I do so now we're going to go back to the machine and so once right at the edge and then once again at the inch or two point five centimeter line and then the very nice thing once I am happy with the bag and everything's done I'll just find that gap and just pull the ends of the gap tight so the edges come together and still nice and close to those two edges and then we're done so on an important top stitch like this that's really gonna show I try to do very small back tacks organized as you go and just make sure that that lining just turns like hair inside we don't want to see the lining poking out see how it wants to poke out there just roll that to the inside now I'm getting my edge up against the inch or two point five centimeter line and I'm feeling with two fingers that there's no extra folds happening inside here and then back up right where I started okay and here's my gap and I'm just going to so nice and close to the edge there there's two beautiful banks basically for free right and so if you're trying to build a business on Etsy or you're trying to do a fundraiser pretty great that you can get free materials that you can turn into something really beautiful and you know what's nice is that each one of the tote bags that you make are gonna be completely different they're each gonna be unique so I hope you enjoyed that hope you learned something and if you did learn something you know what you got to do you got to hit that subscribe button my name is Catherine and I can't wait to show with you again see you next time [Music]

Channel: Catherine Sews

Views: 3,405

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Upcycle sample books, Repurposed fabric sample books, Upcycle fabric, Repurpose fabric cut offs, Material books into ..., sew a tote bag, scrap fabric projects, box corners, lined tote bag, sew straps to bag, sewing, sewing business, make money from sewing, sewing fundraiser, etsy, ideas for etsy, how to sew a tote bag

Id: tc9JIH_j6g0

Length: 23min 29sec (1409 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 10 2020