Zippered Lingerie Pouch Tutorial

Having just been on vacation, I found I was missing a nice little bag to put my undies in so they wouldn’t get lost in my suitcase. An organized suitcase feels so civilized and grown-up. So I played around with a few shapes and sizes and came up with the zippered pouch I’m showing you how to make here.

 In fact, making this bag was so much fun, I made a bunch.  Guess what everyone’s getting for Christmas this year, tee-hee?  

MATERIALS:

    1 nylon zipper, 14”
    4 pieces of fabric 10” high by 15.5” wide (2 for the outside, 2 for the lining)
    2 pieces of fusible interfacing 10” tall by 15.5” wide
    Ribbon for trim (this is optional)
    Sewing supplies and sewing machine

INSTRUCTIONS:

    Cut 4 pieces of fabric (2 for the outside of the pouch and 2 for the lining) 10” high by 15.5” wide.
    Cut 2 pieces of interfacing, 10” high by 15.5” wide; iron the interfacing onto the wrong side of the OUTER pieces of the pouch.Lay one piece of OUTER fabric right side up.
    Lay the zipper face down along the long side of this piece. Since the fabric is a bit wider than the zipper, there will be some excess on each side. This will be your seam allowance.

Place a LINING piece of the fabric FACE DOWN on the other side of the zipper so the zip is essentially sandwiched between 2 pieces of fabric. Using your zipper foot, sew across the entire side.

Repeat for the other side of the zipper and press open. Each side of the zipper should be sandwiched between your pieces of fabric. Press open.

If you want to add ribbon trim like I did, pin it wherever you like on the OUTER layer of fabric.  Do NOT sew through both the outer and lining layers. Sew as close as you can to each edge of the ribbon. Press again.

Turn your layers of fabric so they are right side together, with the outer layers facing each other and the lining layers facing each other.

Pin all the way around leaving a 4” space open on the short side of the LINING layers. This will allow you to turn the pouch right side out and have no seams exposed.

Cut a 6” long piece of ribbon for the pull. Fold it in half, and tuck it inside the OUTER pieces of the long side of the bag with the raw edges pointing out so it’s sandwiched between the layers.

Begin sewing on one of the long sides. When you come to the zipper, fold it so both sides of the zipper tape are touching, with the zipper teeth pointing towards the lining side of the pouch. This will make the zipper neater.

Sew the other long side, folding the sides of the zipper against themselves again.

Sew the short side of the OUTER pieces and the short side of the LINING pieces. If you forget to leave your 4” opening on the lining pieces just open the stitches with a stitch ripper so you have enough room to get your hand in.

But before you turn the bag right side out, you need to “box” the corners. This gives the bag some shape and also makes it a bit more interesting. To do this pull apart one corner of the bag, making a point as shown, using the side seams as a guide. Sew 2” in from the point. Repeat on each corner and trim off the excess.

Reach through the opening on the lining side of the pouch and begin to gently turn the bag right side out. Poke the corners open with your fingers.

Sew closed the opening of the lining pieces of fabric. Push the lining into the bag.

Press all sides of the bag to give it a crisp look, including the boxed corners on the bottom.

Enjoy your new pouch!

NOTES:

    Try using contrast fabric for the inside of the pouch. I tried this with my next bag and just love it.
    Play around with the dimensions of the bag to make an infinite combination of sizes. Just make sure your zipper fits across the top of your bag.
    If you are using particularly soft fabric you might want to fuse interfacing to your lining pieces as well as the outer pieces to more structure. On the other hand if you’re using something heavy like canvas you may not need interfacing at all.