Inspired by nature and motived by sustainable principles
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The Charcoal (’From Rawanda’) and the ‘New Blue‘ Coffee Sling bag’s (pics below) were hand-dyed by me using a mixture of natural dyes. These lining colours are a once-off and cannot be repeated.
The stone coloured lining (’From India Coffee Sling Bag’) (pic below) is dyed by my suppliers with environmental dyes and processes. The print is a brilliant turquoise.
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There are also two new bird pouches in my shop: The ‘Orange you beautiful’ (left) and the ‘Disa’ (right) bird pouch.
These coffee sacks were found by chance and I fell in love with them. I did not know what I was going to do with them….but I could not leave them there so I bought a selection. Two days later I went back for the rest. They were too gorgeous to leave any behind …
Then, as per usual, for days I thought about what kind of bag these sacks wanted to be …and it seemed as though this design did not want to wait. At the same time I was busy with an environmental competition with the CPUT students and Hemporium was one of the sponsors. They provided some organic Hemp canvas swatches for the students to see what the fabric was like so that they could design their products accordingly. After seeing and feeling this fabric (which I thought was beautiful) I had a ‘Eureka’ moment: Why not use the hemp canvas together with the coffee sacks? When I got home I put the two textures together and they were a match made in heaven.
I always start a new design by drawing a selection of bag designs in my journal. Then I select a few and play around with the fabric to see how it moves and how it hangs. The final design for this bag came rather quickly and I pinned it together to get the full effect.
Then I worked out the pattern pieces for the bag. This process always takes me a long time as I have to give it 100% focus all the way through. I am not a natural at working out how the pieces will fit together and I often have to ‘build’ the bag in my head. I cannot be disturbed doing this or I have to start all over again.
Once this is done I create the pattern pieces. I use newspaper because if I make a mistake with the pattern, it is not a costly mistake.
After this I make my first sample. I still have not learnt yet from my mistakes as everytime I tell myself, “agh, you have the pattern right this time, you do not need to use cheaper fabric. Use the real fabric. I am sure it will be perfect”.
As expected, it was not.
Luckily only a few changes needed to be made and I made these on the proper card pattern pieces: the overall size of the bag was too big, the strap was a little bit too long, I added an extra pocket inside the bag and changed the tuck sizes. Otherwise, the whole bag was the quickest I have ever made anything from start to finish.
The Organic Coffee Sling Bag is my favourite bag. This goes to show that sometimes the best things happen by chance.
I absolutely ADORE this new bag … for several hundred reasons …
1. It is the perfect all day, everyday market bag. I am not a ‘big bag’ person but I have not been able to get my Organic Coffee Sling Bag off my shoulder. I am too attached. I can fit everything into it and it does not look full or empty on my shoulder. It just looks great!
2. It is 100% environmentally friendly. The main fabric is a RECYCLED Jute coffee sack, the lining is certified ORGANIC Hemp canvas of the highest quality (it is the fabric that Rembrandt and Van Gogh created their masterpieces on), the very sweet big Wren wooden buttons close the bag and there are 3 great pockets inside that my Moleskine diary fits into perfectly. …and that’s not all: My laptop sits in the bag both lengthwise and upright! 
3. Each bag has it’s own special uniqueness and story. There are bags from Zambia, Guatamala, Brazil, India ….all over. They are also from FAIR TRADE farms which is nice to know. I especially love this mark on one of the bags: “Save the Amazon Use Jute”.
4. When I do take the bag off my shoulder I do not have to worry about the fabric getting dirty. It is such an happy-go-lucky-bag.
5. The tactile quality of this bag is so interesting. The Jute is rough to touch but I cannot stop hugging the bags none-the-less (and Mischief, my cat, takes every opportunity to curl up asleep on them). They have been worn soft by their journeys and the roughness is not scratchy or hard. The Hemp heavy-duty canvas is also the perfect match becuase it stabilizes the open weave of the jute, is strong but soft and smooth. The bag also has a great smell - with a hint of coffee.
6. The two sides of the bag are completely different. I can turn the bag around and it looks like another bag. For example, the two pictures below are from the same bag.
I cannot rave enough about the Organic Coffee Sling Bag. I battled taking photographs of them for my online shop/s because they each have a personality (and the bags refused to stay perfectly symmetrical). They are made to be worn, used and loved.
Go and see the ‘Organic Coffee Sling Bag’ in my etsy and dawanda shop.
