Blowin in the wind

Presenting. . . . . . . . my arty farty customised canvas bag.

A few miles away from here is a council tip, and on a windy day the plastic carrier bags which are brought in on the trucks with the rest of the rubbish, are tossed a mile or so and deposited amongst the hedgerows. This makes the place look untidy and people complain, so the council have to employ agency workers specifically for the job of cleaning it up..

This is the picture of messiness that came to mind. Bags littering the ground and caught in the trees, fighting a desperate battle against the wind in their bid for freedom, only to be ripped to shreds and scattered far and wide. Bio degradeable? Not for another five years.

I wanted my bag to have a message, so I decided to decorate it with plastic carrier bags to convey this. First of all I unpicked the stitching and took the handles off. They are very flimsy so I threaded a piece of rope through each one. Luckily I have some very soft white rope that I recovered from a container on the back of my lorry, a few years ago. It was used to secure the contents, no one wanted it so I brought it home, just in case I could find a use for it.

The bag itself is rather flimsy as well, it needed a lining. My first thought was to find a piece of fabric, but that wouldn't be in keeping with the plastic versus canvas theme. So I looked in my box in the kitchen, and found a plain green plastic bag which was a perfect fit. Sewing the lining and the handles to the bag was the last thing I did.

To build my picture I needed different coloured plastic bags. I made some pieces by fusing (ironing) together four layers. This makes it thick enough to sew through without it tearing. If you are going to do this put brown or greaseproof paper top and bottom so the iron doesn't stick to it.

So with lots of pieces made I cut out the shapes. The blue sky was from a Millets bag.

I made lots of miniture carrier bags and stitched shop names onto them.

The grassy pieces along the bottom are from Millets and Trespass bags, the outdoor shops. I found the little bird on a charity bag, and the tree trunks are made from Tesco wholemeal bread bags.

Everything was stitched on individually, starting with the grass, tree trunks, sky, and green tops. Then the smaller pieces were added.

Hope you like it. I am quite pleased.