Friday, August 21, 2015

Disney Inspired

A few months back, a co-worker put in a special request for some bags for her Mom,sister and friend. She wanted bags for these girls to carry on the Disney cruise they will be going on in a couple of months.  She asked if I could design each of the three girls a tote bag inspired by their favorite Disney characters.  I LEAPED at the opportunity! Design bags that were both outside of my norm AND based on Disney inspiration??? I could not WAIT to get started!!

I started by getting the characters that she wanted: Ariel, Mary Poppins and Maleficent.  I began sketching out a few ideas to present to her. I wanted to keep the basic design of my bags the same and not add a ton of embellishment.  I wanted to keep all of the cotton panels and pockets in the same spots and let the colors and patterns speak for themselves and give the impressions of the characters.

After a couple rounds of drafts, I got an official OK and got to work.  I started with Ariel.  I had purchased some green scales fabric for a little mermaid costume I was going to make for a friend but never finished. (Sorry Jennie! I still have it all cut out if you ever still want me to make it!) I some more of the scales fabric, some purple, red and green cotton as well. I made the top strip of the bag out of the red fabric.  The pocket strip, I layered with the purple and the green scales.


This color scheme gave a pretty good Ariel vibe, but I felt like it needed just a little something extra.


I took a plain seashell and painted it with Martha Stewart multi-surface paint in Pearl finish-color "Purple Martin". If I haven't mentioned it before, I LOVE the Martha Stewart paints!! They have fantastic coverage and I have used them on a variety of surfaces and have been quite pleased with the results. I used E6000 industrial glue to attach 2 pins to the back of the seashell and pinned that onto the bag.  With that, the Ariel bag was complete!


Up next was the Mary Poppins bag! I was seriously excited about this one.  My friend wanted a bag inspired by Mary Poppins' white "Jolly Holiday" dress.  I grabbed a bunch of white eyelet lace, some red fabric and white and red satin ribbon.  The top panel was made using the white eyelet lace.  I added a ruffle to the center as well as a red bow.  For the pocket panel, I sewed strips of white ribbon to the red fabric equal distance away.  I then attached this strip of red to the center of the white pocket to mirror the corset portion of her dress.



When all put together, I think it turned out pretty awesome!!


Last, but certainly NOT the least challenging, was the Maleficent bag.  I'm definitely no stranger to Sleeping Beauty, but figuring out an inspirational design to portray this Disney villain took some thinking.  I googled some pictures of the animated version and up with a design that worked.  I found this cool marble looking black color along with some purple and neon green.  I purchased some purple satin ribbon and got to work.

I started out with the top strip.  I wanted this piece to echo Maleficent's headdress, since her outfit is relatively non-descript.  I sewed lines of purple satin ribbon onto the black fabric.


I didn't really notice, I mean I guess they were always there (its been a while since I have watched Sleeping Beauty) but Maleficent's headdress has purple stripes on it. Seriously, google it!

For the pocket portion, I layered the green, purple and black fabric in different sizes.  At this point, it was definitely giving me a Maleficent vibe, but I wanted it to have just a little something more.  I felt it needed a nod to Maleficent's magical staff to sort of pull it all together.  I took a wooden craft ball and painted in green using Martha Stewart paint in "Scottish Highlands". Then, I sponged on some swirly accents in "Citrine Gold". I used the industrial adhesive to attach pins to the back and pinned it to the bag and.....TAHDAH!!


I'm very happy with how they all turned out and had so much fun designing them! I plan to make more Disney inspired bags in my mini sized tote bag.  I'm pretty excited about the concept of my Disney inspired tote bag designs being carried around on a Disney cruise!! How cool is that???

1 comment:

Friday, August 21, 2015

Disney Inspired

A few months back, a co-worker put in a special request for some bags for her Mom,sister and friend. She wanted bags for these girls to carry on the Disney cruise they will be going on in a couple of months.  She asked if I could design each of the three girls a tote bag inspired by their favorite Disney characters.  I LEAPED at the opportunity! Design bags that were both outside of my norm AND based on Disney inspiration??? I could not WAIT to get started!!

I started by getting the characters that she wanted: Ariel, Mary Poppins and Maleficent.  I began sketching out a few ideas to present to her. I wanted to keep the basic design of my bags the same and not add a ton of embellishment.  I wanted to keep all of the cotton panels and pockets in the same spots and let the colors and patterns speak for themselves and give the impressions of the characters.

After a couple rounds of drafts, I got an official OK and got to work.  I started with Ariel.  I had purchased some green scales fabric for a little mermaid costume I was going to make for a friend but never finished. (Sorry Jennie! I still have it all cut out if you ever still want me to make it!) I some more of the scales fabric, some purple, red and green cotton as well. I made the top strip of the bag out of the red fabric.  The pocket strip, I layered with the purple and the green scales.


This color scheme gave a pretty good Ariel vibe, but I felt like it needed just a little something extra.


I took a plain seashell and painted it with Martha Stewart multi-surface paint in Pearl finish-color "Purple Martin". If I haven't mentioned it before, I LOVE the Martha Stewart paints!! They have fantastic coverage and I have used them on a variety of surfaces and have been quite pleased with the results. I used E6000 industrial glue to attach 2 pins to the back of the seashell and pinned that onto the bag.  With that, the Ariel bag was complete!


Up next was the Mary Poppins bag! I was seriously excited about this one.  My friend wanted a bag inspired by Mary Poppins' white "Jolly Holiday" dress.  I grabbed a bunch of white eyelet lace, some red fabric and white and red satin ribbon.  The top panel was made using the white eyelet lace.  I added a ruffle to the center as well as a red bow.  For the pocket panel, I sewed strips of white ribbon to the red fabric equal distance away.  I then attached this strip of red to the center of the white pocket to mirror the corset portion of her dress.



When all put together, I think it turned out pretty awesome!!


Last, but certainly NOT the least challenging, was the Maleficent bag.  I'm definitely no stranger to Sleeping Beauty, but figuring out an inspirational design to portray this Disney villain took some thinking.  I googled some pictures of the animated version and up with a design that worked.  I found this cool marble looking black color along with some purple and neon green.  I purchased some purple satin ribbon and got to work.

I started out with the top strip.  I wanted this piece to echo Maleficent's headdress, since her outfit is relatively non-descript.  I sewed lines of purple satin ribbon onto the black fabric.


I didn't really notice, I mean I guess they were always there (its been a while since I have watched Sleeping Beauty) but Maleficent's headdress has purple stripes on it. Seriously, google it!

For the pocket portion, I layered the green, purple and black fabric in different sizes.  At this point, it was definitely giving me a Maleficent vibe, but I wanted it to have just a little something more.  I felt it needed a nod to Maleficent's magical staff to sort of pull it all together.  I took a wooden craft ball and painted in green using Martha Stewart paint in "Scottish Highlands". Then, I sponged on some swirly accents in "Citrine Gold". I used the industrial adhesive to attach pins to the back and pinned it to the bag and.....TAHDAH!!


I'm very happy with how they all turned out and had so much fun designing them! I plan to make more Disney inspired bags in my mini sized tote bag.  I'm pretty excited about the concept of my Disney inspired tote bag designs being carried around on a Disney cruise!! How cool is that???

1 comment: