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Monday 2 May 2011

Making Bias Binding Tape...and a bag!

So today i had a rather productive day! It was the last day of a 4 day weekend, and i spent most of it sewing uninterrupted, which was brilliant.

For a while now i have been planning to make a bag (first mentioned here) from Lisa Lam's Bag Making Bible. However, the main sticking point for this project was the requirement of a 50mm bias tape maker. I accidentally bought a 25mm version instead (opps!). Also, I haven't actually seen a 50mm one available anywhere except online, and i was umming and ahhing whether to buy something that i may only need for one project. Plus i would then need to factor in delivery time, and i was itching to get on with this bag. So, eventually i decided to have a go at making my own tape without gadgets. It was actually surprisingly easy! I already had sort of an idea of what to do thanks to a couple of tutorials previously flagged up by Andrea at Invisible Flower. I basically followed the same procedure but folded the edges inwards and pressed with a hot iron, rather than pulling it through the bias tape maker. Since there are so many excellent tutorials available (as mentioned above) i won't go into the method in great detail, but in brief:

I first cut 10cm strips from my chosen fabric on the bias (diagonal!).


I then sewed these strips together at a 90 degree angle, trimmed the seams and pressed. At this stage i had long strips of bias fabric, as shown below.



I folded the strips in half and pressed, to mark the centre. I then folded in each side and pressed with a hot iron (the operative word here is hot...which i forgot and then burnt myself...opps!!). And voila....50mm bias binding!


I won't lie, the folding in was a little bit fiddly. I found it easier to press on the right side (without the folds) as this way the folds did not move around. However, i am pleased with the finished result, and i think i would definitely do it this way again, rather than buy bias tape makers in many different sizes. However, i can also foresee that for smaller width bias tape this process would be much more fiddly!

Once i had my bias tape, there was nothing holding me back from making my bag...and here it is! I'm really pleased with how it turned out :)




I hope you all had a lovely (and productive) weekend...whether it was 2, 3 or 4 days for you!

K x


5 comments:

  1. What a lovely bag! :) I've never made my own bias tape, I imagine it to be super fiddly, but yours looks so neat! :)
    Ashley x

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  2. Wow Kat, your bag's amazing and I can't believe you made your own bias tape!!!

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  3. Gorgeous bag, it looks really professional. I've still to make anything from that book but it's calling me now! Weird coincidence - I made my own bias binding for the very first time this weekend too. And it worked! x

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  4. That's so nice Kat! I'm impressed you actually made and pressed all that tape yourself, it takes ages!!!

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  5. Thank you! I think making bias binding is one of those things that sounds more complicated than it is...honest! I'd definitely do it again.

    Jane - Spooky! Glad yours worked too :) I would highly recommend Lisa's book...not just for the projects, but all the tips on things like attaching binding, making gathers etc. are brilliant. Her method of attaching zips is so simple, i use it for all my bags and purses! I really want to make the tote bag but it looks so complicated, i think i'll have to work up to it!

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