Oro Rosa Catalina Crossbody Bag

Welp, it's official. The bag-making bug has taken a big bite and is not letting go. In the past 2-3 months, I've made as many handbags as garments. I find the task of assembling all of the pieces and hardware challenging, yet fun and exciting. There can be some unpleasant or tricky bits to sew, but with practice and patience, this will be less of an issue.

 

Alright. Let's get on with the details and awesomeness of this pattern.

left:  image from Oro Rosa Patterns - Catalina

right:  my version

 

What initially drew me to this pattern was the quilted design on the front. Last year, I bought several cuts of vegan leather from a local fabric store thinking that I'd make some chucks. I never got around to buying the sneaker kit, so the cuts sat untouched in my basement. Until now.

I didn't immediately plan on making a red bag, but as soon as I unrolled my fabrics, the red jumped out and said "MAKE ME". I dutifully obliged.

Then I saw pictures of a red bag on Oro Rosa's website made by ABCB Crafts.

 

Yep. This was definitely happening. Our bags are mostly similar - except that I used coordinating, rather than contrasting, topstitching thread.

There is some asymmetric wonkiness with the rectangular shape of the bag. I work with shapes for a living, so it's something I noticed immediately. And the top zipper isn't quite aligned with the lower strap connector. It's all good, though. I LOVE this bag so much and don't care about the unevenness. I'll take notice to sew and mark things more carefully next time. Oh yeah, there will be a next time. 

 

Fabric & Notions:

• unmeasured length of textured red vegan leather (exterior body, strap, gusset, zipper panels)
• 1 yard of quilting cotton (interior lining, exterior pocket lining)
  
• 1 fat quarter to make 2" bias binding
  
• approximately 18" #5 metallic nylon coil zipper (exterior and interior closures)
• 3 x #5 zipper pulls (exterior and interior closures)
• 6 x 10 mm double-capped rivets
• 2 x 1" D rings
• 2 x 1" swivel clasps
• 1 x 1" wide-mouth strap slider
• 2 x 1" strap end caps
  
• 1 gold "handmade" metal plate
• interfacing:  fusible woven, Decovil (heavy and light) 
• fusible fleece
  
• thread:  regular, heavyweight
  
• needles:  90/14, 125/20 
• feet:  standard, non-stick, narrow hinged zipper
• throat plate for thicker fabrics
  

Construction:  I sewed the bag on both the semi-industrial and domestic machines. I was being fussy about coordinating thread colors to the red vegan leather and green interior lining. This meant needing to change thread colors often and I wanted to minimize this as much as possible.

I used a narrow hinged zipper foot to bind the interior seams with bias tape.

 

 

image source:  www.jukihome.com

 

I like this foot because it allows for a close stitch without the bulk of the foot getting in the way. I've yet to use it to insert zippers, though I think it would make that task less cumbersome.

 

This was my first time using Decovil (heavy and light). Decovil is a fusible interfacing that is designed to give additional structure to bags. I was concerned that it would make my fabric too stiff, but it didn't. It provided enough heft to strengthen the sides whilst still maintaining flexibility. Oro Rosa also includes separate pattern pieces that exclude seam allowances and are used to cut the Decovil.

I was also a bit hesitant about adding fusible fleece on top of the Decovil heavy to the front panel. I thought the extra layers would make the bag too thick and harder to turn right side out. It wasn't hard at all and the fleece made the quilting design more defined.

The hardest part for me was binding the interior seams. I could not get a good handle on the bag to sew the binding neatly. There just was no easy, non-swear-inducing way to maneuver the bag under the presser foot and keep a uniform 3/8" stitching line. The narrow zipper foot helped, but I'll definitely have to practice more.

Hardware & Notions:  I got hardware and notions from a few sources:  Wawak, Goldstar Tools, Tandy Leather, JoAnn Fabrics, and Emmaline Bags. I'll describe my experiences with each below.

Wawak:  dark brown nylon coil zipper tape, zipper pulls, Decovil light, topstitching thread

I am a regular Wawak customer and the experience I had in getting hardware only solidifies my loyalty. I wasn't sure if their red-colored nylon zipper tapes were a match for my fabric, so I sent them a swatch. I spoke with Joe from technical support for almost an hour as he worked with me to find a suitable match. He texted me pictures of various zippers and thread alongside my fabric and made recommendations on what he thought would look good. I couldn't be more happy with the choices!

 

In addition to wonderful customer service, Wawak prices are very competitive. I can't remember the last time I bought notions (except interfacing) from JoJos. It's been a minute.

Goldstar Tools:  D-rings, swivel clasps

This was my first purchase from Goldstar and while their prices are also competitive, the hardware quality is not the same. The metal is not heavy - when compared to similar items from other sources. I debated whether or not to use this hardware. I decided to go for it to see how it holds up on the long run. I don't think I'll purchase hardware from them again - or least not for a while.

Tandy Leather:  double-capped rivets

Tandy has good quality hardware and I'm satisfied with their rivets. I have several finishes with the extra long posts and think these work well with the bags I'm making. They also carry D-rings, so I'll do a comparison.

JoAnn Fabrics (JoJos):  Decovil heavy, ShapeFlex woven interfacing, fat quarter

Except for patterns, fat quarters, and interfacing, I rarely shop here. Their inventory just doesn't do it for me and playing the coupon game is old and tired. Wawak sells Decovil heavy, but I didn't want to buy a 10-yard bolt for $86.50 not knowing how I would like working with the material. JoJos sells 1.5-yard rolls for non-sale price of $20. This makes it more expensive per yard ($13.33), but there is less risk of losing more money if I don't end up using it. Plus sometimes their interfacing goes on sale for 40-60% off, so it's possible to get it a bit cheaper.

 

For garments, I prefer to use interfacing from Pam Erny and Fashion Sewing Supply. It's expensive, but the quality is SO worth it. For bags, I like using ShapeFlex 101 by Pellon; it's one of very few Pellon products I'll use. This woven interfacing is perfect for use on cotton lining and fuses without any problems.

Finally, I make my own bias tape using fat quarters. Pre-made bias tape is often a cotton-polyester blend and I prefer 100% cotton bias tape for better flexibility. JoJos has a decent selection of fat quarters and I can mostly find what I need/want.

Emmaline Bags:  extra-wide strap slider, "handmade" metal plate, strap ends

I've always had a good experience with supplies from Emmaline Bags. The hardware quality is good and seems to always be in stock. Purse feet that I bought a couple of years ago for my first Boronia Bowler are starting to fade, but I guess that is to be expected from faux gold. 

The staff at Emmaline are helpful and answer questions quickly.

Instructions:  The instructions were very well written and illustrated. Figures are clearly labeled and correspond well to the instructions throughout. This is my first time sewing an Oro Rosa pattern and I'm impressed.

Conclusion: I'm very pleased with the handbag, though there are areas that can be improved. Next time, I'll carefully mark the stitching lines on most (maybe even all) of the pieces. Some of the wonkiness is probably from inaccuracies in stitching. 

 

I'll also use thicker thread (e.g., TEX 70) to sew the seams. In most of the bag-making videos I've watched, people used threads of higher TEX size. They're also sewing on full-industrial machines, so maybe this is standard.

 

Finally, I don't think I'll use swivel clasps to attach the straps. The clasp is okay, it's the swivel part that can be annoying. I might use some sort of permanent attachment next time. The bag can be worn across the body or on one shoulder and I don't intend to wear it any other way. So the need for clasps isn't there.

***

This is the third item in my Make Nine 2022 grid (update soon). I am resisting the urge to start another handbag because I really should work on clothes.

L