Friday, April 18, 2014

Make Your Own 221B Baker Bag: Sherlock Purse

Make Your Own Sherlock Bag
I've been working on several cool furniture projects for an upcoming Spring Market. Unfortunately,
most of those are still unfinished.

However, I did find time to finish one project, not furniture but something else I've wanted to do for a looooong time: a Sherlock Holmes purse!

I'm a bit of a geek, especially when it comes to books/movies, and I recently came across an Etsy shop that sells bags that look like Sherlock Holmes' door.


So cool! I wrote to the guy and asked him about them and found out they are just flat, two-dimensional pictures. There is no real hardware on the bags: no coolio door knocker, no numbers. I probably should have realized that right away, but I geeked out over it and thought maybe it had actual hardware included. Nope.

I decided in order to be truly cool, I needed a purse with actual hardware. Then, I remembered that Tim Holtz makes a mini lantern.

From Amazon




Thus was born my 221B Baker bag! I bought the bag at Goodwill. It seemed like a good size and had a nice, flat black back that made a perfect canvas for my "door." Then I found a black fabric belt to criss cross over the purse and create the illusion of panels intersecting. After much searching, I found a shop on Etsy that sells small metal numbers and letters. I painted them with gold acrylic, then did a light misting of black spray paint to make them look old and weathered. I also ordered a pendant pull on Etsy that resembled the actual door knocker from Sherlock.

I assembled it all by fastening the hardware on and sewing/gluing the belt to the purse. Finally, I tucked the battery pack to my lantern inside the purse pocket and allowed the lantern to hang outside the door. The final result is just awesome! At least for a geeky girl like me. :)
 
 

3 comments:

  1. I'm a Sherlock fan, too, so I really love how this bag turned out. Very clever of you to make up your own after seeing the inspiration picture. I'm sure either of the current Sherlock's - British television's or U.S. television's - would love it! : )

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  2. Hi, I would love to have such a bag. Is there any way you might make another one of these and sell it?
    Please mail me: alanna@weibsvolk.org

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