Free-Style Handmade Bags & Skirts

By Woongjin Publishing, Woon Jin, North Light Books

Book Overview

Whether you're a sewing novice or an aficionado looking to add patterns to your DIY repertoire, Freestyle Handmade: Bags and Skirts is for you. Projects include a variety of skirts for roaming the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1600611966
• ISBN13: 9781600611964
• Release Date: January 2008
• Publisher: North Light Books
• Length: 143 Pages
• Weight: 1.41 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.0" x 0.8" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

Lovely and Useful experience

I am absolutely impressed with the vast knowledge and experience this book offers. Not only does it give you beautiful patterns to try it also teaches you how to make alterations to suit your individual style and size. Invaluable advice. The section on repurposing pants was great. For the beginning sewer this book will push your comfort level (It will make you better). For the experienced sewer it will tickle your fancy. Overall enjoyed.

Let your creative juice flow!

This book is totally different from most sewing books from the US. If you like craft books or skirt making books from Japan, then you will like this one, too. The book introduces multiple designers that lead the fashion industry of Korea. They are not in kawaii flavor though. I am used to this type of overwrapped pattern and it does not bother me at all, hence the skirt pattern--it is better to have a pattern in various size and I don't know why they didn't, but instead, there is an instruction of size alternation. I am going to try and make skirts for my super slim size 0 daugther using this method. The bags are simple and cute, some are too plain but with your creativity, you could make it OOAK indie style. I love the bag on the cover and I bought this book just for this, and I see other projects pretty atractive and interesting. That was a bonus. I recommend this book if you like challenging, enjoy DIY, and think that just following an instruction to make exactly the same stuff as 3,000 other readers is boring. There are so much flavor that you can add to the basic ideas you'll see in this book.

Creative Ideas--Korean Flair

I am an experienced sewer...I sew everyday...I have made tailored garments and lingerie...I quilt...I do embroidery by hand and machine...and I REALLY like this book. I would say it accomplishes what it sets out to do: provide creative and fun projects that will result in unique bags and skirts. In response to previous reviews: The full sized patterns that come with the book are meant to be traced. We in the U.S. are not used to this, but it very is common in European patterns such as Burda magazine. Instructions are clear and concise and do not leave you guessing, but part of the fun is not being dependent on pre-printed patterns that give cookie-cutter results. The strength of the book is its creative, edgy designs. The basic skirt patterns provided are in size x-small (the book is Korean) and instructions are given to enlarge as needed, but really, any 99-cent skirt patterns would suffice. The book is about embellishment and customizing the look of the basic silhouettes. Of the 40+ projects, only 2 involve remaking pants into skirts, and they are from the chapter called "Reform and Remake." This re-purposing of unwanted garments is all the rage among "green" sewers....see the popular Threadbanger website. But there are also dainty, sophisticated, and everyday-casual skirts featured in the book's other chapters. This NOT a "take junk and make other junk" kind of book!! I think the book's projects will appeal to a wide range of ages and tastes. My college age daughters love the book. I plan on making 2 skirts and 3 bags for myself (and my taste in clothes is hardly avant-garde.) And my mother-in-law has requested the reversible tote for her upcoming 78th birthday!

great for young people

This book is perfect for teens and twenties. If you like to rehab old clothes or make your own trendy clothes, this is the book. One of the freshest sewing books I have seen! I looked through it at a bookstore, and plan to put it on my wish list so I can make some of the items for my kids.