Can you ever have enough bags? No, not really. There is a bag for each occasion. And the infinite character of time dictates that there must also be an infinite amount of occasions – ergo it’s up to us to produce an endless amount of bags for all those occasions.
The question however is if we really need a bag for each occasion. Wouldn’t it be better to have multi-functional bags? Yes, for practical reasons this would be great. And thus I set out to make such a bag for myself.
Use cases
- 🔘 Daily carrier
- 🔘 Airplane carry-on
- 🔘 Weekend trip bag
Design requirements
- ✅ Easy access to inside
- ✅ Compact, tight design for action-mode (cycling/running)
- ✅ Strong, water proof en resilient
- ✅ Big pockets for many items
- ✅ Dynamic shoulder strap
Product pictures
In the next chapter – behind the scenes – I discuss the creation process with a bit more detail. I’m not going to pretend it’s a revolutionary bag design, it’s fairly straightforward, but it’s exactly what I wanted to have myself, so I made it.
Action pictures
Behind the scenes
I bought all of the hardware for the bag on Saturday (some of the hardware used for this bag actually comes from the Wolt delivery bag that I salvaged last year on Malta) and then I spent all of Sunday on the construction of the bag. I combined two different patterns, one for the outer shell and one to guide me through the process of the internal pocket. I freestyled the shoulder strap.
During the process I had to unstitch and redo various parts, which is why the process ended up taking me all day long. The inside pocket was notoriously getting caught up in other seams when I was not looking. I can tell you it was quite disappointing to finish a really neat top stitch, only to turn around the project and find out that I had accidentally sewn the internal pocket to the lining.
Another reflection point from this project is that I should make sure to align all zipper directions. Right now the big outer zipper opens to the left, while the internal pocket zipper opens to the right. This makes it virtually impossible to open the internal pocket without completely opening the outer zip. You also have to change hands to open the both zippers. Quite annoying and it could’ve been an easy fix. But you live and you learn and hopefully I’ll remember this lesson for my next project.
