She's Crafty...

Ta Da! Welcome to Shannon's First-Ever Tutorial! I was browsing around sewforum.com today and saw a very nicely done version of a placemat purse that I had never seen before. The person who posted her pictures didn't post how she did it, so we (me and a few others on the board) decided that we could just figure it out. And we did! I was at work all day, so I started playing around with a piece of paper, and ended up with a very nice office paper purse, complete with staples. I'll have to post that picture, just because it's funny. Anyway, I have a ton of placemats lying around just waiting to be made into bags, so I got home and after putting my neanderthal/toddler to bed, I started to play with a real placemat. And this is what happened:

Alternative Placemat Purse Tutorial
(better name is pending - I'm open to suggestion!)


1. Start with your standard placemat. This one is 13” x 19”.

2. Fold in half lengthwise.

3. Rotate

4. Fold bottom up until you have the desired size of your bag. Pin and sew all the way around (you don’t have to do the bottom unless you want a top-stitched look). Make sure you use a heavy duty needle or a walking foot, depending on the weight of your placemat. This one is heavily interfaced, so it was pretty thick at the corners.

5. After sewing, you’ll have two pockets on the inside. It’s magic! Feel free to attach any closure at this point; snaps, Velcro, ribbon, whatever. I didn’t attach a strap to this one as I didn’t have any cord on hand, but I would attach it here.

6. And, voila! The almost finished placemat wallet/purse. This is relatively small, so I envision it to be used as a wallet while traveling, shopping, clubbing, any time you don’t want a large clunky bag with you. Great for moms! I didn’t permanently attach the ribbon, since I’m not sure if I’ll stick with it or not. I may embroider it.

Variation: I didn’t add any depth to the bag, but here’s what you can do:
1. Flip bag inside out
2. Cut about a 1-inch notch out of each corner at the bottom of the bag (I hope you can visualize this..Word won't let me copy the cute little graphic I drew)
3. After cutting, smoosh corners together and sew across the smoosh on both corners. I’m sorry, but I don’t have a picture to illustrate this, and my drawing skills are limited. If you have any questions please ask!
4. Flip bag right side out, and now you have a little depth to your bag!

There you have it! If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask, and I'll do my best to help you. Special thanks to tzb123 on sewforum for my "A ha!" moment! I'll be sure to post pictures of the bag when I do get it completed with strap and embellishment. This should give you the basic idea, though! Go on! Be creative!