A Purse with a Past

I love to have a unique piece of fabric to work with and this purse has been created from a very special piece of linen that was recently given to me . . . let me tell you more . . .

In November I was at the Kamloops Old Courthouse Christmas Fair and one of the visitors to my booth spent some time asking about my work and telling me about vintage linen tea towels that she had inherited from her mother. I believe she said that the tea towels were handwoven in Eastern Europe many years ago, and she wanted them to be used by someone who would appreciate the workmanship.  Before the end of the show, she came back and presented me with several of these beautiful tea towels ... they must have been very lightly used as they were soft from being laundered but showed no wear or stains.

I have been thinking about how I would use these tea towels for some time and have come up with a few ideas but this week I decided to use one to create a purse. I also have some squares of recycled silk kimono fabric that were given to me by another friend and I decided that these brown/green/orange ones would go together in the creation of a purse.


I pieced some of the kimono squares and then appliqued that large "patch" to the linen. I then used more linen for the lining, with quilt batting for a little added structure, and stitched them together. I quilted the kimono blocks and added a few lines of machine quilting to the background as well.

I even added a little pouch to the inside of the purse before adding the cross body strap made of more of the linen ... and a piece of Velcro closure on the flap for added security.

I spent quite some time adding the sashiko hand stitches to the purse.  I used three colours of embroidery floss ... one is variegated warm brownish colours, one is variegated chartreuse colours, and the third is a spring green ... and they are stitched in rows around the kimono block as well as across the purse in a few more areas.

I am very pleased with how this purse turned out and I hope that it will appeal to someone shopping for a unique spring bag.  You can see more views and detail photographs in my Etsy shop.