I found this incredible fabric in the sale for just a pound per metre. I’m honestly not sure what fabric this actually is; my best guess is a kind of canvas – slightly shiny and textured and reasonably thick. The fantastic pattern of silhouetted buildings would be perfect to make something for an architecture-loving friend, but I wasn’t too sure what I would be making.
Going back through my folder of downloaded patterns, I came across the Notebook Folder Tutorial from Riley Blake Designs. I’d made one of these previously, but struggled to get all the layers through my Mum’s sewing machine, so I wasn’t too sure how this canvas would behave!
The inside of each panel is a black polycotton which compliments the silhouettes and also helps balance the thickness of the fabric.
I don’t trust my hand-sewing enough to stitch the button on by hand, so I machine stitched it on after completing the folder. There was just enough space to sew it in while holding the slanted pocket out of the way.
I decided to skip the interfacing as the canvas is sturdy enough without it. I couldn’t find any batting in my local shop, so I picked wadding instead and quilted it to the inside panel so it wouldn’t shift around as I turned the folder the right way around. I also cut the wadding shorter than recommended, leaving a half inch border around, to ensure the final seams wouldn’t overlap it.
The quilting could be a bit neater; if I made another, I might try and make more of a feature of the quilting, picking a better pattern than a simple cross on the back.
I used a denim needle in my sewing machine due to the thickness of the canvas. It stitched really easily, which was a pleasant surprise after the struggles I’d had with the previous one on an older machine!
There’s a couple of seams that aren’t entirely straight, mainly because I had the canvas layer on the bottom, and it seemed to slip as the feed dogs fed it through the machine. But overall it came out really well.