I try to put my very best effort into every thing I make, but still a lot of my sewing projects don’t go exactly as planned. Usually I can salvage them – adjust the fit, hack a dress apart to make a skirt, add fabric panels, etc – but occasionally I end up with wadders & sewing fails. I don’t normally post them – mostly because they don’t normally happen (as far as Lord-this-can’t-be-saved pieces) – but I’m going to put myself out on a limb for y’all today. Also, I think it’s kind of funny and I like laughing.
So here it is – the Amy Butler Sweet Harmony handbag FAIL.
It doesn’t look too bad at the first glance – kind of lumpy, and the handle is doing something weird, but that can be overlooked, y/y? I must admit that this bag is definitely a Monet – from far away it looks ok, but up close it’s just a big ol’ mess.
Let’s look at the other side!
Oh, that’s nice – what the hell is that giant dent over the cell phone pocket? What the hell is the cell phone pocket even doing? And look at the handle – that seam is supposed to be at the bottom, not turned up to the side.
Here, I have stuffed some fabric (isn’t that fabric delightful, btw?) in to show you what it looks like closed. WHAT THE EVERLOVING FUCK.
I’m going to take a break here and explain why this bag failed. First of all, I definitely used the wrong fabric and interfacing. The pattern calls for quilting cottons or home decorator fabric… and I used some squishy wool coating (very similar to wool crepe). When I was interfacing my pieces, I realized I didn’t buy enough fusible (I went by the pattern directions, but good ol’ Amy didn’t bother to mention that her suggested fusible yardage was for 44″ wide, not the standard 22″ wide), so a lot – like, half – of the pieces are interfaced with sew-in interfacing. This does NOT provide enough structure, especially coupled up with that squishy-ass coating. Also, the coating snags quite easily, which makes the whole thing look cheap and, well, shitty. Also, Amy Butler is totally onto me.
The next problem – and the biggest one, imo – is that I got way too frustrated with the bag and rushed through it as quickly as possible. I’m a pretty fast sewer, but I absolutely have my limits and when they are reached I have to stop because otherwise I start getting sloppy. This bag is a prime example of LT being sloppy – the seam allowances are crooked, the corners are fudged pretty badly, and the whole inside is just wack. Oh god, the inside LOL. Hold on, I want to show you the inside.
See where I didn’t clip the seam allowance at the curve? Or how about the fact that the lining does not fit in there at all? The whole thing is just… wrinkled and poochy. Ew.
Some more Bag Fail pictures:
This is what the bag looks like open – gap fail. You can also see where the interfacing & outer fabric are pulling away from each other.
The bottom is a special piece of work all on it’s own – I sewed the bottom panel on, realized I didn’t quite catch the fabric on one side, but instead of picking the stitches out like a normal person, I just hand stitched it together. Yeah, that looks real nice.
Here is the picture that makes the laugh the hardest.
Are you ready?
LOL IT DOESN’T EVEN STAND UP STRAIGHT WTF.
I will have you know that I actually carried this bag around over the weekend, despite hating every second of it. I carried it aaaall the way to Atlanta, and seriously considered leaving it behind every time we stopped in a store. I still don’t know what to do with it. I actually feel bad taking it to Goodwill. I might just throw it away (after I salvage the purse snaps, of course!) – it is that bad.
As an apology for making you sit through multiple pictures of something that looks like my cat threw up, here are some images of Landon & myself wearing furry hats at the H&M in Atlanta:
Anyone else have a sewing fail they want to share with the group? C’mon, it’s FUNNY.
