I’ve (almost) finished a project I started noodling with a few weeks ago, and figured I’d share some pictures. This started off with me experimenting with acrylic yarn, rather than 100% wool, and using knots to join the lengths. It’s worked out okay, and I love the colour of the yarn (it’s what I’ve used for icons elsewhere on the site).
After doing a round I figured I’d try and turn it into a small tote bag for my wife. More like a handbag, really.
The bag is done using Mammen Stitch (Finnish 1 + 2) using Hayfield Spirit Chunky yarn (405 Casper colourway, dye lot 2310) and took about 2/3 of a skein.
The plan is to created a small length the same thickness as the strap, attach this over the top of the bag, and connect it to a button. I’ve picked up some lovely, purple shell buttons off Etsy for this purpose.
Things I Did Well
- Knotting the joins (using a Uni Knot) worked well. I needed to be careful pulling the knot through the loops, but for the most part, it looked pretty much invisible.
- Mammen is a nice stitch to work with. I’ll use it again for bags.
- I improved my tensioning, remembering to stretch and tension the length as I was making stitches, which led to a consistent and neat pattern.
- The mattress stitch to join the bottom of the bag worked better than I expected.
Thing I Didn’t Do Quite So Well
- I should have created the strap separately and joined it to the bag, rather than reaching one side of the bag, detaching from the round and creating the strap, then reconnecting to the round and continuing. The point at which it joins the bag is weak, as it relies on just four stitches, and so needed (messy) reinforcing.
- I carefully finished off the bag so that the colours balanced, then realised that I needed another round, leading to a symmetrical transition from orange, to purple, and then back to orange – and then one round of purple on top. If I’m going to be neat about it, I probably need to think this through better next time.