DIY Art Deco Canvas Bag

Hi Everyone!

I'm really excited to share this project with all of you. This is something I used to do with my mom when I was younger. She has TONS of artsy tricks up her sleeve that I'll be sharing with all of you over the next few weeks - I'm sure she won't mind.

To do this project, all you need to do is decide on an image you like (you can draw it yourself directly onto the freezer paper, or you can cut the freezer paper down to 8.5 x 11" and print out a design).

This project is much easier than it looks, so let's get started!

What you need:

Art work - design your own or find some online and print it out

Freezer paper

Exacto knife

Iron & Ironing board

Cutting board, mat or thick magazine

Fabric paint or Acrylic paint

Canvas Bag

1. Decide on your design. For the bag above, I had my son sit down at the computer with me and come up with what he wanted. I used my design software, but you could very easily find a .jpeg image and copy and past it into a word document.

2. Once you have your design ready, cut down a piece of freezer paper to 8.5 x 11 and then you'll be able to print you image directly to the paper (just make sure the side getting printed on is the paper side and not the wax side, or you'll have an inky mess).

3. Using an exacto knife, cut out all of the areas where you want to have color filled in - I cut out all of the shadow sections to make the image above.

4. Turn your iron on it's highest cotton setting, and place the freezer paper design wax side down on the canvas bag so that the paper side is what will be coming in contact with your iron. You don't want the wax side touching the hot iron, you'll ruin your iron.

5. Press firmly with the iron until the paper is set to the fabric.

6. Paint over the image in any color you like. The wax paper is sealed to the fabric, so the paint will not bleed.

7. Allow to dry completely - probably overnight. I made the mistake of taking the paper off too soon with this bag, so some of my edges are not perfectly formed.

That's it! Now you have a completely customized canvas bag that you can use for shopping, to carry books, for the gym, to hold toys and much more. Get creative with this one, you don't have to stop with just one color. You can layer colors and designs, just be sure to allow each color to dry completely before adding the next.

What do you think? Did you try this one? Let me know how it turned out...

Thanks again everyone and have a great night!

-Lisa