Amy Butler Sophia Carry-All

We've all seen the blog posts about the frustration involved in making the Amy Butler bags. But we also see the pride and satisfaction of many a seamstress that have finally completed either the Weekender Bag or the Sophia Carry-all. Well, I am one of them. I have completed one Weekender Bag with many scars to show but also great pride and a feeling of "having arrived" as a seamstress.

So isn't it stupid to consider making the Sophia Carry-All with fresh memories of the frustrating Weekender Bag? Isn't it even more stupid to do this without a pattern? Yes, call me stupid because I am doing it!

I went to Fiona's last Saturday to buy denim fabric for a bag I am busy making. Whilst the assistant cut my fabric I saw the most gorgeous winter fabric on sale. It is sort of like a tweed fabric. It would make stunning skirts, I thought. So I bought only one metre of the brown (with a pattern as in the picture above) and a plain grey. By Saturday night the skirts were forgotten and I was busy making a Sophia bag pattern.

By Sunday night I had finished the outside, bar the bottom. This fabric is just so perfect for a travel bag. It is durable, strong and looks so classy. It could easily be a designer bag.

This is a side view of the bag. My second perfect zipper installed! I am so grateful to other bloggers who post their sewing experiences. I learn so much from them and I hope sometime someone might learn something from me. I forget the blog address, but I found such useful info on making the Sophia bag on a UK blog of someone called Jonag? I will look it up.

My thoughts so far? I based the sewing mostly on the above blogger's comments and referring to my Weekender Bag pattern. I did not expect the bag to be quite so big though. I'm not sure if I made the pattern too big or of the real bag is as big, but it is almost bigger than the Weekender Bag. Just as frustrating as the Weekender bag with all the layers although I seem to have no problem with piping. I am really pleased about the result so far and am now pondering the best way to do the lining and bottom. I still cannot believe I only used one metre of fabric!

To be continued...