Fabric Covered Rope Purse

SUPPLIES NEEDED:

-Sewing machine in GOOD WORKING ORDER. **Bring all the sewing machine feet that came with your machine

-100 feet of braided outer cotton, polyester core 3/16” rope (Sew There sells top quality rope for these purposes!)

-Fabric

-Matching thread

-Glue stick (Elmer’s style glue)

-12” ruler

-90/14 NEW needle

-Scissors

-Straight quilt pins

-Sewing clips

-Button, must be large and allow room for 3/16” rope to secure around it. (Sew There has these great buttons!)

-Large, strong shafted sewing needle (think: heavy upholstery needle) to sew on button. Thread for button sewing should match the button.

Instructions on what needs to be done prior to arriving for class:

Prewrap all 100 ft of rope with fabrics of your choosing. **As to fabric amounts needed, that depends on your wrapping. When you wrap a width of fabric strip on rope, measure how much rope was covered. That will determine the number of fabric strips you will need to cover the amount of rope for each color if you’re doing a two color purse, or a one color purse. Everyone wraps a little different, so please measure your single strip wrapped segment to know what you need for fabric.

REMEMBER: Strips of fabric are 1” wide.

Make sure your fabric is wrapped snug to the rope, no loosely.

EXAMPLE of math used: Let’s say you get 25” of rope covered with one width of fabric strip.

25” of coverage = 2.08 ft.

100 ft of rope divided by 2.08 = 48.07 – round up to 49, the number of strips of fabric needed for covering rope.

One color purse or “end of day” style scrappy purse. Based on the measurement you got when you wrapped one width of fabric strip, you will need to cut as many strips as required to cover all 100 feet of rope. Use math to determine strips needed to cover all 100 feet of rope.

Two color purse as shown in photos. (Do not cut rope, all rope is continuous)

Wrap first 35 feet of rope in color chosen for bottom

Wrap the next 40 feet of rope in color chosen for middle section

Wrap the remaining rope (25 feet) in same fabric as bottom.

(If you want three colors, choose the segment you wish to make the third color and wrap accordingly)

** Put two clips at the end of the bottom section wrapping so that you know which is bottom section of the purse, that is what you will be sewing first.

Yes, the rope will have a tendency to twist as you are wrapping as you have learned in the rope bowl class. Counter the twist as you wrap by turning it ever so slightly toward you after each wrap. You can also “hang” the rope and allow it to untwist periodically.

OR bundle the rope and secure it by a fabric tie or large rubber band, only allowing so much rope out of the bundle to wrap at a time, then releasing more rope as needed, that way you can “hang” the rope bundle easier to untwist as you go.

If you have any questions, please feel free to call me (Nancy McCaffrey 919-800-9911)