Painted Fabric Pouch

It’s a Zipper Pouch Series and it’s all about fun fabric variations of the easy zipper pouch shared a few months ago.

There are times when the right fabric with the right design can’t be found or is too expensive or is hard to get. But don’t sweat it. Paint it! Painting fabric is an easy and inexpensive fix to a fabric dilemma and, can I say it? The painted fabric can be used to make darling zipper pouches.

It was difficult for me to narrow down the ideas I had for painting fabric. There were a number of directions I was thinking about. Here are a few I considered: famous art pieces, a series of flowers, colorful and cute animals (for my children), simple stripes and polka dots and found object prints, among other things. I chose a springy nautical route after revisiting this oar image on Pinterest. The good thing is whenever I do this again, I have plenty of ideas to pick from.

I think the inside of the pouch is just as fun as the outside. When the zipper is undone, it’s such a fun treat to see the color and print inside.

I learned another process tip sewing this set. Instead of sewing each pouch individually – one side of the zipper, then the other, top stitching around the zipper and then sewing up the whole thing – I prepped and did step one on all six pouches before moving on to the second step. I completed them all much quicker and it was an easy process. It was a bit like a one person assembly line but I’m all for being as efficient as possible.

Obviously, you can paint your fabric any way you’d like. The options are literally endless; inspiration can be found anywhere you look. While I leave the designs up to you, here are a couple things to note about the actual painting:

-I’ve only ever painted cotton fabrics so I can’t speak to how paint and non-cotton fabrics work together

-You can use any number of paints products. Fabric paints, acrylic paints, liquid fabric paints (I like Pebeo Setacolor Transparent Fabric Paints), liquid fabric inks (I like SEI Tumble Dye Fabric Spray) and even spray paint works.

-Recently, I found a textile medium to add to acrylic paint to make it adhere better to the fabric and not crack in the wash.

-Adding paint to fabric will make the fabric tougher. Using a stronger needle will be helpful.

Painted Fabric Pouch - Zipper Pouch Series | this heart of mine

If you’re interested, here’s how I created the oar-inspired pouches.

Supplies:

-fabric – I used a white denim-like fabric
-paints – I used Martha Stewart and FolkArt
–textile medium
-backside and inner pouch fabric
-zipper – I bought my assortment of zippers here, available in a variety of lengths
–easy zipper pouch tutorial

After cutting the fabric down to size, I used a pencil and ruler to create the simple line design of the oars.

Then, mixing some of the textile medium with my paint, I painted the squares.

Once the paint was dry, I ironed the squares according to the directions. The combination of the white denim-like fabric and paint made for a tough, canvas-like fabric. I used my denim needle to put the pouches together.