garden district saturday market bag
This is how I look after work most days, trying to hustle home as much fabric as possible.
I knew the minute I saw Heather Bailey’s new fabrics from Free Spirit at Quilt Market that I had to make a bag with them. Garden District is a collection of wide, heavy canvas that’s just asking to be tossed around and treated roughly. It screams, “I can take it and look good too!” I wanted a big bag to show off the large Nouvelle Rose print, so I chose Heather Bailey’s Saturday Market Bag pattern.
I’d somehow never made a Heather Bailey pattern before this, but it was just as easy to follow as I expected. And I actually started and finished it in the same day, so I avoided some unfinished project guilt there. The pattern includes several versions of the bag, and I made option 3, without the bow or contrasting sections. I decided to go for the reversible option, so didn’t put any pockets in either. The pattern calls for lightweight canvas for an interfacing, but since I was already using heavy canvas for both the outside and lining, I left the interfacing out. And am glad I did. Another benefit of this canvas is that it’s extra wide at 58″, so even though the pattern calls for 1-1/8 yards each of outer and lining fabrics, in the canvas it only takes about 3/4 yards each.
I love how simple, pretty, and BIG it is. It’s named right, because I’m so ready to take this thing to the farmer’s market Saturday! Because I intended to use it as a shopping bag and I know I’ll be filling it to the max, I didn’t put in the optional snaps that let you contract the sides. So since I left out bows, pockets, interfacing, and snaps, the bag was a quick sew. From cutting out fabric to the last topstitching it probably took at most 4 hours.
The one cheating moment I had was to machine stitch the straps closed instead of hand sewing them. I figured since I was topstitching anyway, it wouldn’t look any worse to have a seam there.
This photo also gives you a bit of a sense of the texture of the canvas. It’s substantial weight gives it a more professional look. We’ve had the Free Spirit home dec weight sateens in the shop, but this heavy canvas is new. I’m very happy with the quality of it and I think it will be quite useful. I’ve got a backpack in mind for my next canvas project. For now the Saturday Market bag is on display in the shop, and kits are available for this very version.
August 18th, 2011 at 7:30 pm
I love the bag and thanks for a great review!