I am dedicated to cleaning through my workspace piles before the Big Move next month. As such, a lot of unfortunate doll corpses are going to be brought back to life in other forms. Like here! She was one of my first ever Belfast dolls, I just cut her front half off, piled some hair on top of her, and sewed her onto a giant cerulean paisley tote bag. There you go: Dork Girl Bag!
Two more tote bags, this time monstrous! Both are heart monsters, one is purple striped, the other blue velvet. Psycho eyes? Singing teeth? Who knows what is going on, I chalk it up more to my late night sewing skills than gurgles of a subsconscious that needs investigation. But however they came into being, here they are (oh and on Etsy too)!
Two more royal blue tote bags, from an AIR-produced crop of Hand Prints. Up for sale soon!
I painted + sewed the fronts of these bags a month ago, but it was only after going to Puerto Rico (and witnessing hundreds of Carnival Cruise tourists with their tropical holiday bags) that I figured out how to design the rest of them. So here we are! Really simple — wide fabric handles, cinched with ribbon — a little classier than the usual tote bag, but even easier to sew. I’ll put them up for sale in a few days, when I’m ready to let them go.
Another Dancing Dork Girl bag, this time with green satin dress, purple pockets, and a big blonde poof of hair. This time on a rose-pink messenger bag, with charcoal felt/violet button closure.
I’ve been dreaming up different scenes to sew onto small tote bags/medium purses. In the meantime, before fullblown domestic scenes, I’m experimenting with patterned circles and dancing figures. My favorite are the snowflakes — using fabric or interfacing instead of the usual printer paper — which only take a few minutes to design and cut, and much longer to attach to the bag fabric. I’ve used the scraps from the cutting to form into other larger shapes, etiehr in a circle or striping across the bag.
I found some mandalas I had painted onto fabric back in Budapest, when I discovered a great little pamphlet (in Hungarian) all about designing complex circles. So I cut out the painted circles, backed them up with some old blanket, and affixed them to a deep turquoise canvas.
Finally, Girls in Glasses and Dresses doing dance moves! I love making girls, here they will travel around on bags while practicing relatively easy moves. Later I’ll move onto some West Side Story routines, for now, my bag girls will do a little Mashed Potato. More of these to come! And hopefully I can finish up the actual bags in the next week and get them up on Etsy!
I was going through old photos and realized I’d never posted these bags up — they sold at Oakmont at Spring, and one I mailed to Poland, Babimost, and another I have kept as my ‘beautiful scraps’ bag, but here they are! I want to make some more Big Red Hand bags, maybe with some Henna patterns sewn onto them.
