{"id":7810,"date":"2026-09-13T01:40:48","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T06:40:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/?p=7810"},"modified":"2026-09-13T01:40:48","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T06:40:48","slug":"tote-bag-fetish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/?p=7810","title":{"rendered":"Tote Bag Fetish"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It seems I might have a bag problem, as in too many. After years of collecting them I have now turned my attention to making them, and what fun that has been!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I recently came across a poem by Brian Bilston about someone who has a lot of bags. Naturally I thought he must be writing about a weaver. Somehow I thought it was only we weavers\/spinners\/knitters who can never resist the opportunity for yet another tote bag (okay, maybe also quilters). I was just about to write a comment on his poem when I saw that someone had already posted this:” I think you’ve been in my house!” There was no indication that she is a weaver\/spinner\/knitter, so maybe the predilection for tote collecting goes farther afield.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you’ve never read Brian Bilston’s poetry before, you can find his poetry at https:\/\/brianbilston.com\/<\/a> here. Or you can look for his books<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bags<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

you have bags
of bags<\/p>\n\n\n\n

collecting bags
with nothing in them
except bags,
inside of which are other bags,
full of bags<\/p>\n\n\n\n

you have enough bags for life
for a hundred lifetimes–
if there was a prize for the total number of tote bags
you would totes have it
in the bag<\/p>\n\n\n\n

don’t know why you need so many bags
when all you ever put in them
are other bags
— Brian Bilston<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A couple of years ago, after I took a sakiori class with Janny Simpson, I continued to weave off my fabric. I used it as supplemental fabric on a denim ground to make a tote bag. I am smitten with it still, in spite of its lack of sewing skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I’ve bought plenty of tote bags over the years from places I love, like the Dovecot Studios in Edinburgh, a festival in Horta in the A\u00e7ores, totebags from every weaving conference I’ve ever attended….the list goes on and on. Here’s the tote I bought in Nijar, Spain, in April after wishing I had bought it the year before, when I first saw it. I had to buy two so I could share the wonder with a friend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Over the summer I used this tote bag from Spain to make another attempt at sewing one myself, with fabric I got in Sardinia in May. Do you remember how I asked a restaurant and vineyard owner to sell me this table runner right off one of the tables in his restaurant?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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My sewing construction for this bag was much better. It helps to have a good tote bag as an example, along with help from my sewing friend Emily, and all the YouTube videos available. In these digital times there is always a solution to finding information. I love carrying this bag. Now that I’m back in Bosa (Sardinia) I have bought more of this fabric to share with friends. And of course I stopped by the restaurant to show the owner how I used his table runner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And since I love to see what other weavers make wherever I travel, I was thrilled to find women here in Bosa who also sew with these fabrics, I’ve bought three more bags, but only two of them are mine! I just got the two that are shown together hanging on a door knob recently. All of these were made by a local woman, Paola Porcu, who sews lots of interesting items out of these traditional fabrics. The two I bought are lined with handwoven fabric that looks like Swedish canvas lace (that I just finished weaving myself in 40\/2 linen as shawls!). That fabric was woven by Paola’s mother. What a treasure! How could I resist, and how could I just choose one of these stunning bags. They are HUGE, as you can tell in the top photo. I plan to showcase lots of yarns in these bags, and showcase the bags themselves by having them out for viewing near my favorite chair for knitting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before we headed home last June we stopped in Alghero, a little further up the western coast of Sardinia from Bosa. I found this man’s weaving studio, where he also makes tote bags, among other things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not all sewing projects turn out well on the first attempt. This tote bag is waiting at home for my return when I will try to figure out what on earth went wrong!! It’s made with fabric I love–made on a day spent with my good friend Jody who does wonderful work with botanical print dyeing. She guided me through this attempt, and I have a lovely raw silk scarf now. But I’m actually more intrigued with the cotton flannel fabric we used for an iron blanket on our scarves. I decided to use the cotton flannel botanical print for a hand bag. The sewing went well, using the pattern “Mini Poppins” by Aunties Two<\/a>, but when I finished the bag by inserting metal stays to shape the bag something went terribly wrong. I hope I can fix whatever is wrong. It would be a wonderful bag to carry in fall and winter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tote bags are SO useful, and also beautiful. They hold memories of events attended, travels, and the gathering of so many rich experiences. The materials for making them provide a grounding time of creating and sewing the bag. How can I possibly resist them? Yet the poet Brian Bilson is also correct that many of my tote bags hang on hooks and are filled to the brim with other tote bags.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It seems I might have a bag problem, as in too many. After years of collecting them I have now turned my attention to making them, and what fun that has been! I recently came across a poem by Brian Bilston about someone who has a lot of bags. Naturally I thought he must be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,49,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fine-craft","category-sewing","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7810"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7826,"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7810\/revisions\/7826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}