Coin Purses and Felt!

Because I don't have enough mess, right??

But since I had the felt out already I thought I'd try some coin purses...but I didn't have the necessary zips required so I wanted something that I could just shut through a loop or a button...something easy!

                  I knew I'd find it if I looked!

Also I received a lovely order of felt squares in heaps of colours. It's awful but I'd forgotten I'd ordered them and I'll have to look up the order to figure out what the company was I ordered them from but they're perfect for these little purses. The felt is just a bit stiffer than the stuff I have which works great!

I got it!! The felt came from Little Blue Box is located in Perth, WA. I bought it off ebay.

This is the first one I played with before I got the new felt. And while I do like it (it's so cute!!) there were aspects I was sure would improve it. Firstly the two short sides where too low. Coins could (and did!) escape out of the purse in the rough and tumble world of my handbag. Not what I was aiming for, obviously. 

And as a brief side note, the die-cut flower shapes are from bettyoctopus on Etsy . Absolutely scrumptious little things and so many different varieties of shapes attainable depending on how you layer them!

So, now with the new stiffer felt I made some modifications to the original design and tried again!

I was really happy with this one! Even though I had to refine the process as I went along! The pattern was too big to cut out the design in one piece with one piece of felt so I retraced the purse into pieces. The front flap, the bottom flap, the rectangular bottom and the two short sides. Then I had to trace each shape on the felt I chose, twice. For an outer cover and an inner insert. Which meant I had to assemble it a different way to how I'd done the first one. I ended up sandwiching the four pieces of felt (joining two sides which included the inner and outer felt) with a tight running stitch. It actually looks really nice. You can see the layers of colour peeking through.

I also found that while the sides were now high enough, folding the thing down flat was almost impossible because the extra fabric kept wanting to fold over under the top flap when I buttoned it up. Fortunately I hadn't started the blanket stitch around the top edge yet. I found it I scooped out the middle of the short sides, it folded up much better. As you can see from the pic though, not yet perfect...but close!

 And now to the lasted edition! On top of all the other adjustments I'd made up to this point, I also slightly scooped out the rim of the bottom flap. And as you can see above, it folded up pretty much the way it was supposed to! No bump where there's obviously an excess of fabric. And it looks so damn cute!! Lovely bright happy colours! 

I've really enjoyed making these and will definitely be making more. But I thought you'd be interested in the process. Felt is such a wonderful forgiving material and it lends itself to so many beautiful things!

What do you think I should try next?

See you all later!

Dx