Mood DIY: How to Sew a Watermelon Purse

Fruit prints and accessories have been one of the cutest trends this summer, so today I made the shiniest watermelon purse on Earth. I love it.

Items used:

• 1/2 yard Metallic Red Crackled Vinyl
• 1/4 yard Metallic Green Crackled Vinyl
• 1/4 yard Whisper White Pebbled Vinyl
• 9 16L/10mm Black Buttons
• 2 D-Rings or O-Rings
• 1 1/2 yards Metal Chain
• 1 Black Zipper (at least 12″ long)

The first thing I did was cut 2 semi-circles from each color of vinyl, with the following dimesions:

1. Green: 12″x7″
2. White: 9.75″x5″
3. Red: 9″x4.5″

I also cut out a strip of green vinyl for the base of the purse. This piece was 19″ long, 2″ at each end, and about 4.5″ toward the center.

Once all the pieces were cut, I had to create the front and back panels of the purse, which meant making it look like a watermelon! The white semi-circle was top-stitched onto the green, followed by the red. One of the best things about these vinyls was the ease with which they went through the sewing machine.

For the seeds, I sewed 9 shank buttons in an evenly spaced pyramid pattern – 4 across the top, then 3 and 2 respectively. I chose to keep them just on the front panel, since the other one would constantly be bouncing against my leg while I walk anyway. No sense in wasting buttons!

Before adding the base, I attached the two panels to the zipper. Since I used a fairly long one, I shortened it about three inches from the vinyl and sewed a little cotton tag on the end so it wouldn’t come apart or scratch anything in my purse.

The ends of the base were folded down slightly and a small length of red vinyl was used to add rings to each end so I could attach a chain for the purse strap.

The last step was to finally add the base! It was sewn to the bottom of  each panel, with right sides together, then turned right-side out through the zipper opening.