COMING SOON…
Komebukuro, or “rice bags”, were traditionally used in Japan to carry offerings of rice or beans to temples and shrines for festivals and ceremonies. This bag is inspired by these traditional bags.
The bag is made out of five panels, the four sides and the bottom. Each side has a different hitomezashi pattern. Below you can see the four panels ready-stitched.
COMING SOON…
Here´s a video to give you a few tips on how to start. I have a few videos available with my other Sashiko kit instructions, you can find them in the menu under Sashiko in the rolldown menu. Happy stitching!
I tie knots when I work with Sashiko as I usually make things that need to withstand the constant usage and handling. You can use regular knots, but if you need to tie two threads together in the middle of a row I suggest you use the traditional joining knot, hatamusubi.
Here are the ready panels, front and back side. I have stitched two panels with one colour and I chose to combine two colours for the other two panels. You can see on their back sides how I did it.
To avoid messy edges and freying you can stitch the edges around before you start stitching the Sashiko patterns. Here are three variations, two with sewing machine and one hand stitched.
After I stitched the panels I start to sew them together.
After I have sewn all four panels together, I pin the bottom to them. The panels wrong/back side is facing outwards.
Then I sew it together. I chose to stitch the edges at this point.
When all the five panels are sewn together, I sew the inlining fabric together. It´s done on the same way as the previous panels or it can be done with two panels where one of the panels is as long as all four side panels.
Here you can see the inner lining already inserted and the ears for the string/ribbon also in place. I usually use a lot of pins while I´m putting the layers and ears together which then I remove half of when things are in place (see secound image below). This helps to stabalize the fabrics while working.
