Monochrome Stowe Bag

Pattern: Stowe Bag by Grainline Studio
Pattern Size: Small
Pattern Adjustments: French seamed, hand punched/sewn gusset using warping thread
Fabric: Cotton drill remnant from The Fabric Store hand painted with pebeo Setacolor opaque - colour 19 black

The Stowe Bag, designed by Fringe Supply Co. was originally available as a ready made item for knitters as a project bag. Those that know me know that I own a number of Fringe Supply Co. project bags, but none the Stowe. Grainline Studio have slowly been releasing the numerous project bags of Fringe Supply Co. as patterns, and I am so excited to sew the Stowe, it has been in my pattern stash since its release many (MANY) moons ago.

I am playing around with storage of my numerous sewing supplies at the moment, I have a number of tool roll and tool tote patterns in view, but as I already own the Stowe pattern, this was a nice excuse to give it ago. The idea is my current project will be stored in the Stowe, along with any notions and specific supplies. As I am now teaching, I am finding having all my project requirements bundled together (needle, thread, fabric, notions and specific tools) in one place (for my students this is a basket), it is an easy way to have everything ready and good to go when sewing time permits.

I have a freeze on fabric buying right now, my stash consumes a double wardrobe and really needs to get more attention. I am going through a bit of a print stage right now and am really enjoying irregular monochrome geometric prints. There are a number of cotton drill remnants in my stash, and to satisfy my desire for a monochrome print I decided to give pattern painting ago.

The pepeo Setacolor is a 45ml bottle of fabric paint which air drys for a minimum of two hours before being set via 5min of iron heat. It is simple to use, and if you are interested in getting into surface design of fabric but don’t want to invest in the screen printing process (yet) this is a fantastic starting point. I played around with some basic strip patterns, the black is quite polarising so I decided to break up each pattern with a half inch border allowing the stone white colour of the drill to balance the black.

I cut the pattern pieces prior to painting, this was because the seam allowance is 1/2”, if the seam allowance was smaller I would have considered painting prior to cutting. The painting process of all four pattern pieces took roughly five hours from measurement to application followed by half an hour of iron setting. As the inside of the bag has the printed pockets but wrong side visible of the stone white drill I have opted for a random print effect on home made bias binding (from the cotton drill), this gives the inside a little more depth rather than using stone white bias alone.

I opted for french seaming the visible seams to keep things crisp, this created quite a lot of bulk, and is still definitely my preferred method for this pattern. My machine struggled with the bulk of the drill, particularly while applying the bias at the end overlap. There was no way my machine was willing to sew the gusset fold (oh I tried), the machine needle was unable to pierce through the fabric deep enough for the eye to loop with the bobbin thread. I opted to hand punch holes with a sewing owl, and hand sewing using a tapestry needle and cotton warping thread. Step 15 is optional, and if using a light-mid weight fabric I would highly recommend, it sets the bag to maintain a flat bottom, as the drill was heavy, my Stowe was sitting flat with no support, due to the bulk and the care taken to sew the gusset I decided to omit this step.

This pattern is a very simple sew, the only difficulty is the bias application, sharp top stitching for the pockets and not overthinking Step 13, creating the bottom gusset. As always Grainline Studio instructions are well thought out, clear and have easy to understand language and diagrams. There are full step tutorials available on YouTube, these are not an exhaustive length and Jen is a clear teacher, explaining EVERYTHING!

I am so happy with how this turned out and cannot recommend this pattern enough. I will definitely be looking at making some Stowe Bags for the sewing school to store student projects.