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| Platinum coloured leather |
On one of my supply runs, I reluctantly picked up a small, but sturdy side of metallic leather. A bunch of them just got liquidated out of the States, so I decided to get one and see if I can ever work with it.
Now, I am no big fan of metallic purses. They had a few strong years of presence back around 2004, and it appears to be, that Fall of 2011 may become their another cyclical return. On occasion, I would find a metallic bag I would like in some ways, like the silhouette, or the feel of leather, but always found it hard to wrap - even my tolerant mind - around the bedazzled atrocities of the decor, tacky logo medallions or out-dated hardware. So, when the leather landed on my table, I knew I will need some time to distance my imagination from the countless images of other people's unfortunate metallic creations.
For the next few days I started doubting if it is even possible to make a tasteful metallic bag...Or, if I can even see any of my existing designs in a Metallic... I almost decided to give the idea up, thinking that "bling" just was not me.
I found images of these several bags, that appeared to be free of all the traditional mishaps of the Metallic trends:
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| Stella McCartney |
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| Lucca-Elliott |
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| Salvatore Ferragamo |
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| Foley And Corinna |
Ironically, all these bags, even though Metallic,- are still of Earth colours - modified shades of brown and beige. My leather was beaming Platinum, making me as nervous, as ever...
I received some great advice from fellow bag makers and fans - to use my Metallic for accents, small purses, etc. Some were way bolder, encouraging me to "just do it" - cut it that is...
I decided to start with the latter, and take steps to tackle my points of anxiety one my one:
1.To soften the look of the Platinum coloured 4.5 oz'er, I needed to apply it to one of my softest and simplest designs. In Metallic.
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| Metallic Limited Finish Sarah |
2. In order to not take the look overboard, I shortened the strap, creating an evening version of the Sarah bag.
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| 1/2 strap for Evening version |
3. Since ties would not work very well of a stiffer leather, I used an understated buckle for strap adjustments.
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| Buckled strap - all one tone! |
Done - The prototype will make it's debut at my booth at Make It Vancouver next weekend....
I was surprised how happy I was with the final result. The next day I wore it out for my very necessary "sampling" walk, and the feedback I got, tells me, that we are on the right track with this one... Needless to say, I went back to my supplier and retrieved another Platinum side for future production.
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| Full metal |
Till further notice, the Limited Finish Metallic Sarah bags will only be available at the
Webshop.
Posted by Jolanta http://jolavdesigns.com
