Thursday, October 28, 2010

Getting the most from repurposed fabric - part one

Do you have a closet full of clothes that you can't wear or don't wear?  Looking for ways to repurpose or upcycle some of them?  This tutorial will show you how to cut the fabric from pants to get the most usuable fabric available.  Once you have some workable pieces of fabric, be creative... make new stuff!  I find fabulous pieces of clothing at thrift stores to make my upcycled bags.  More on thrift store finds in a blog to come.

For now, let's cut apart this cute pair of size 6 corduroy pink pants.  Who wears a size 6 anyway?  These were a obviously thrift store bargain, because there have never been size 6 pants in my closet!




Step one:  lay the pants out on a flat cutting surface

Step two:  using sharp scissors, start cutting at the inside seam as close to the seam as possible

Step three:  continue cutting toward and around the crotch staying close to the seam

Step four:  continue cutting close to the seam down the other leg, all the way to the bottom

This is what it should look like at this point
Step five:  cut from the front crotch to the top of the waistband close to the zipper




This is what it should look like at this point




Step six:  cut crotch back piece from bottom through top of waist 




Now you have these two pieces




This is what one of the pieces should look like

These pants gave me two pieces of fabric 31" x 18".  I think I will make a tool bag  from this fabric.  Stay tuned for part two of this tutorial outlining how to get the most repurposed fabric from a shirt.  You will notice that I did not use a rotary cutter.  I normally use a rotary for everything, but in this case, you will get more inches of the fabric by using sharp scissors and staying close to the seam.  I also do not cut the outside seam - leaving it intact gives the body of the bag more dimension and it is one less seam that I have to make.  I do stitch together pieces of fabric to get the size that I need. 

Comments??...


Enjoy upcycling fabric - let me know what you created with your new fabric!

Angie

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

'They' tell me I need a blog...

After much research on marketing for small business, I have found several resources recommending blogging.  So, here I am... blogging.  Who would have thought, that I (who still has to have my teenage kids help me with technical things - like playing a DVD on one of the many game devices in the middle of my living room floor) could set up my own website and now start a blog?  I guess it is like a VERY PUBLIC journal.. hmm.. I'm a very private person.  How is this going to work?

I think I finally found my niche in the bag making world.  Upcycled fabrics!  I am having such fun shopping at thrift stores for gently used quality clothing to make one of a kind bags.  I have struggled since the beginning of TA-DA Bags (2007) with finding exclusive fabrics.  Now, I continue the struggle of marketing.

So, we will see how this blog thing works out.  Hopefully, I can figure out how to get it linked to my website.  Comments please....