Making a quilted tote bag using a modern disappearing 9 patch

Yesterday I showed you how to make a modern placemat using a disappearing nine patch technique with fabrics from the Banyon Batiks Intaglio collection from Northcott.

Today I’ll use the same technique, add some diagonal contrasting strips and create a tote bag.

materials

• 9 – 7½” squares from Banyan Batiks Intaglio fabric
• ½ yd contrasting fabric (I used a dark brown Banyan Batiks Shadows fabric)
• ½ yd for lining (I used a gray Banyan Batiks Shadows fabric)
• 1⅔ yd of 1″ webbing for straps

Let’s start sewing!

• Make a nine patch block using the 7½” squares from the Banyan Batiks Intaglio fabric. The detailed instructions for this are in the QUILTsocial blog post Making a nine patch block with the new Banyan Batiks Intaglio.
• Cut each nine patch block into 3 unequal sections.

• Rearrange the strips and sew them back together, shifting the sections a little so the seams are not all lined up.
• The pieced block will be approximately 19″ x 19″.

• Place a long rotary cutting ruler on the block, lining up the 60° angle line on the ruler with one of the seam lines.
• Make 2 – 60° cuts in the block to create 3 diagonal sections.

• From a contrasting fabric (I used the dark brown Banyan Batiks Shadows fabric), cut 1 – 1¾” x WOF and 1 – 1¼” x WOF strip. These are the sizes I used, but it’s OK to use different size strips if you wish.
• Sew the 2 brown strips between the pieced sections. This requires working with bias edges now, so handle carefully to keep the fabric from stretching.
• Sew with the brown strip underneath, check to make sure the seam allowances on the pieced section stay flat.

• Square up the edges.

My piece was approximately 19½” x 18½”, but because this is an improv style of piecing, yours may be different.

• Cut 2 pieces of contrasting fabric (mine is the gray Shadows fabric), 1¼” x the length of the pieced section.
• Fold in half lengthwise, wrong sides together to make 2 long strips.
• From brown fabric, cut a strip 9½” by the length of the pieced section. This piece will determine the width of your tote bag so you can change the size if you wish.
• Sew 1 of the 1¼” strips to one side of the pieced section with a ⅛” seam, aligning the raw edges.
• Sew the brown piece to the pieced section with the narrow strip attached. The narrow strip will form a small flap.
• Sew the remaining narrow gray strip on the opposite side of the pieced section, aligning raw edges.

• Layer pieced section, batting and backing. This backing fabric won’t show when the tote bag is finished.
• Using a walking foot, quilt as desired. I used diagonal and straight line stitching, but feel free to be creative and do your own thing!

Come back tomorrow and I’ll show you how to turn this modern disappearing nine patch block, made with Banyan Batiks Intaglio and Shadows fabrics, into a tote bag!