My first project of 2016 has been sewn entirely from stash and I have finally used one of the many purse frames acquired over the years from
trips to the Harrogate show. The purse frame in question was an
8” slide-frame bought from Bag Clasps (which came with a free pattern) and I used this with some leather and a silk twill brought in the Adamley sale last year.
The leather was very soft so fusible fleece was applied to give some body and the silk lining was stabilised with a light weight interfacing. As I was using leather, I modified the pattern slightly to avoid the French seams and I didn't need to use a special leather needle given the softness of the leather, but I did use a longer stitch length as recommended by my sewing machine. I added a zip pocket to the lining and included a small leather loop in a side seam for clipping on a wrist strap.
Two layers of leather, together with the fusible fleece and the two layers of interfaced lining were thick enough to fill the channel of the frame, but extra padding might be needed with thinner fabrics. I’m pleased with my first attempt at using a purse frame and found the slide-in style very easy to use. I also found that Christmas clementines were ideal to fill out and stabilise the purse when taking photographs!
