I love these sketch-bags.
This is what mine looked like when it was new (and I have another one as of today).
I picked stitches selectively with a stitch picker (it is good to be married to a tailor-man) on one side of the bag to make the pockets the sizes I wanted.
Understand that all the bags are sewn in different ways pocket-wise so
I advise you to move slowly in this stitch picking thang
but at least if you make a mistake the bags are only $11
and you can always get a second one….
Then it was perfect. Okay not quite.
But I really am not a beige gurl. Give me grey.
Give me red, orange, green, black, but not beige (and not white either.)
So knowing that De Atramentis Document Turquoise ink dries completely waterproof on cotton paper, I decided to sponge it all over my cotton burlap beige bag.
That worked for the color, very petty, but it kept coming off on my hands even when dry.
blue hands!
So I tried soaking it in a mordant (hey I know a bit about dying)
and that didn’t help either.
I tried washing it several times to see if I could wash excess out.
No dice, still getting blue hands.
So the moral of this story is that you can’t dye a cotton bag with waterproof ink…
Now I will go the old school route and use regular old stupid dyes.
*sigh* into the trash, as I can’t stop it from coming off no matter what…
Edit after the fact. I managed to finally get my bag so I like it
and you can read about how I did that here.
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D.Katie Powell Art 
LOL. Reminds me of another story I’ll share. I bought a black leather bag once. The black rubbed off on my cloths. I went back to the store and asked for a refund and the salesman said, “No, we don’t do that.” I said, “I will sit right here until you give me my money back.” When customers came in I showed them the bag and my clothes. The boss very soon gave me a refund.
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I love it. Polite but gets the point across….
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Here are some ideas:
-leave it out in the sun for a long hot day. (or on a radiator)
-Boil it in water.
– Soak it in vinegar
– Boil it in a mixture of water and a royal amount of vinegar
– Soak it in a very strong salt solution.
– Pack it in 5 pillowcase and tumble dry it. ( chance of ruining your tumble dryer as I didn’t try this one myself)
Hope this helps!!
Dries
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Oh no! Is there really no way the bag could be saved? What if you bleached it out and then tried redying it with a more traditional textile dye? Is there some sort of waterproofing fixative that would work? I know nothing about textiles but just thought I would throw those thoughts out there regardless.
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I’ve pretty good at dying and so far nothing I know of works….
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Ugh. How annoying. Never mind. Every failed experiment is an opportunity for learning and growth after all.
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No! Not a beige gurl, either.
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I have an almost identical bag that is my favorite tool bag. It’s pretty dirty, but still the original beige. I like that you picked the stitches to make some pockets bigger. That never occurred to me, but it would have been handy a few times. It looks good blue, but blue hands can’t be a good thing. How easy is it to get the second-hand ink off your hands?
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I bet it is the same bag — yours is probably just an older version. Getting it off my hands is not hard, but putting my sketchbooks in it is the problem.
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Mine is from Harbor Freight.
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Mine too….
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Might have tried drawing on it with a Sharpie! The permanent ones work and stay put.
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That’s a good idea….
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Next time!!
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