Category: DIY

DIY leather handbag

Anna-Maria7 Comments

Due to a lack of a smaller handbag which is easy to use and carry through the clubs of Berlin, I decided to design and make one myself. I used the same treated leather as in my previous project, the leather tote, but this time sewing the body of the bag with machine and rest by hand.

The bag features include an elongated flap, simple button clasp closing mechanism, and a double strap with rustic metal d-rings to attach it to the bag. Though this project demanded good nerves and patience (not generally virtues of mine), I am very pleased with the outcome. In action pictures to follow soon.

Leather handbag: Selfmade

Blood, sweat and tears

Anna-Maria46 Comments

Apologies for the radio silence, I’ve kept quite busy as my household has been turned into a little sweat shop for the past few days. The whole project started when I got frustrated for not finding the perfect, minimalistic leather tote to suit my needs and decided to make one by myself. I’m still thinking if I should box the corners to give the bag more depth, but at the same time hesitating because it might change the look of the bag to an unwanted direction. We’ll see.

The five-bar gate tally marks were purely a practical solution at first, as I had four stitches holding handle straps in place. Since four bars would have looked a bit silly on their own, I decided to add the fifth element to complete the design. They shall work as my trademark from now on.

Shirt: Boris Bidjan Saberi
Jeans: Cheap Monday
Leather tote bag: Made by me
Rings: Kalevala Koru and custom made

P.S. I know that the pictures are loading very slowly at the moment, I think something is up with Imageshack. Hopefully the problem is just temporary. Hang in there folks!

DIY ripped jeans

Anna-Maria37 Comments
As promised, here comes last Friday’s party outfit which was quite obviously inspired by Ann Demeulemeester’s collections. I love how she plays with black and white every season, and still makes it look so fresh each time. This is something I have actually noted before but it’s also a fact that agrees with the contents of my wardrobe, year after year.


Top: MTWTFSS
Vest: Zara
Jeans: Cheap Monday
Sandals: Bronx
Bag: Vintage
Necklace: Ann Demeulemeester
Ring: Kalevala Koru

Ripped jeans – How to DIY with six easy steps

1. You will need: a pair of jeans, a marker or chalk, sandpaper and preferably a wooden plank.
 
2. Put your jeans on and mark the spots where you want the slashes to be made. You should at least mark the knee area because that will be hard to determine when the jeans are off your body. It’s also good to keep in mind not to make the marks too high on the thigh area, unless you want your pockets to show through the slashes.

3. Take off the jeans and place them on the floor. If you have the wooden plank, place it inside the leg to provide support.

4. Fold the sandpaper in two and start sanding the jeans horizontally where you want the rips. When the jeans start to rip and a hole occurs, stop and rip the rest of the way with your hands. Be careful not to rip them all the way from seam to seam because the holes will enlarge in the wash. I made my cuts about 6-7 cm (= 2.5 inches) wide. (You can also sand the holes all the way through but that is rather time consuming. The reason why sandpaper is the best way to start the holes is for the frayed finish, scissors would result a much more cleaner cut which doesn’t look as “authentic”.)

5. After you are finished shake the lint off and wash your jeans. In order to get even more frayed look on the holes, you will need to wash the jeans in a washing machine. Using a dryer helps to bring out the frayness but it’s not necessary.

6. Enjoy your ripped jeans!

The reason why I wanted to save this outfit for a separate post was because as you can see, I did a little extra slashing on my ripped jeans and wanted to share a tutorial on how to DIY. Ripping jeans is fairly easy but in order to get a nice frayed finish like on mine, it takes a little extra effort. Below the pictures is the tutorial on how I did it. Hope you like the results!

Time machine

Anna-Maria29 Comments
I’m finally wearing my self-made harem pants the way I wanted to wear them originally: with heels, fitted jacket and a lose t-shirt tucked in the pants. Whilst walking around town today, I did feel some curious eyes burning on me, like I’d have this huge diaper in my pants. I could care less though cause these are way comfy, and the right kind of pants for warm spring days like today (+20 Celcius wohoo!). The background of the picture fits perfectly to theme too, looking like a time machine that’s gonna take me right back to this era.
Enjoy your day!

Jacket: JSFN
Wrinkled t-shirt: MTWTFSS
Harem pants: Self-made
Shoes: Vagabond
Ring: Kalevala Koru