DIY No-Sew Envelope Laptop Case

Hi there friends!!

How are you all on this sunny Friday morning?

I'm doing awesome, and I can't say I'm sorry that this week is over... I know you are supposed to appreciate every moment and live it like it's your last, but my History and Literature teachers are making that pretty hard right now... but I digress

Anyways, after about 2 weeks of promises, I was finally able to finish my DIY No-Sew Envelope Laptop Case tutorial, So here it is

But first, the story behind it:

I did not think of the design of this case! Well... I'm not actually sure who originally  thought of these envelope cases... I think they have been around for a while... From laptop cases, to clutches, to purses, to what have you. But my inspiration for this project came from the wonderful blog, I Spy DIY. I was poking around some of their older stuff and stumbled upon this post describing how to make your own chevron laptop case... SO SICK

So I gathered up my materials and set out to make my own laptop case

The only problem  was that there was only a demonstrational video describing how to make your the case, and it had no words

This was a bit of an issue for me, because when I follow a demonstration, I need a LOT of instruction... because of this, my case turned out a bit different, so I thought I would share how I did it! This time in text rather  than video... in case you guys are like me

 Here we go!

Materials:

♥ Canvas: So I had no idea where to get any canvas. I wanted to try to make this laptop case for a while, but I had no idea where to find any canvas... actually that's a lie. I had found canvas at my local fabric store a while ago, but they only had boring solid colours like plain white or black or red... but I wanted something more fun

So I started on my quest to find myself some canvas... I looked around online and found some gorgeous prints, but BOY are they expensive... like 30$ for a yard, before shipping... for that money I can just buy myself a nice laptop case

But there really are some fresh prints out there. If you are thinking of buying your canvas online, go here and here and here

Another option I considered was just buying some plain white canvas and then using some fabric pens to decorate it, but that wasn't exactly the look I was going for

So I thought that I should probably give up on this DIY laptop case dream... until one day I ventured out to IKEA with my pops and discovered their fabric isle. I'm not sure if what they carry is actually canvas, but it's similar and they have wide variety of fun crazy prints... so I picked up this pretty girly floral fabric for 6$ (and it's enough to make 2 laptop cases)... the amount you need will vary depending on the size of your laptop

♥ Felt: You can find felt at any fabric store (probably) but it's a pretty controversial fabric (some people like to argue about politics, I like to argue about fabric... fml) 

Here are the pros and cons of felt:

Cons: Felt falls apart after a while... Eventually it wears out

There is this stuff called felted wool which allegedly doesn't do this, but it's pretty hard to find and expensive $$$, which brings me to my

Pros: It's cheap and easy to find

I went for regular felt because I'm kind of lazy, and I'm sure I will wear out my laptop before I wear out the felt

Again, the amount you need will vary depending on the size of your laptop

♥ Scissors: You'll need very sharp scissors for felt

♥ Ruler: longer the better

♥ Fabric Glue: I don't have very much experience with fabric glue but I just got this "Speed Sew" stuff... it worked fine! Or you can just whip out the good old sewing machine, but then it wouldn't be a no-sew laptop case, now would it?

♥ A Pencil or Pen: To draw out the plan of the laptop case on your felt. Keep the colour light. Since you will be probably using white felt, a dark colour will show through

♥ Pretty Ribbon

Alright, let's get started! First of all, clear your desk... seriously

Next, lay out your felt and place your laptop on it

Alright, so above is a little diagram (thanks to my expert Microsoft Paint skills) of what you will be drawing on your felt... the light purple should be the length and width of your laptop, the mint should be equal to the height of your laptop, and the dark purple should be half the width of your laptop (as indicated by the red lines)... also, just to get yourself oriented, your laptop is sitting in the light purple square #2, so you can start by outlining your laptop!

So once you're done outlining your laptop, you can start working on mapping out the mint part of the diagram.... Take your ruler and out and measure the height of your laptop... if your laptop has a weird shape, just do the best you can :) it doesn't have to be perfect! My height was 2cm

Once you have the measurement, mark it all around your laptop. So in my case, I had a box 2cm away from my laptop surrounding my laptop... if yours looks something like the diagram, you know you are on the right track!

Lets just pretend this photo isn't blurry...

Once you finish that, you can draw out the other two light purple squares (#1 and #3)

These squares are also the length and width of your laptop (the picture above is just showing how it should be the same length and width)

So measure measure measure and draw it out

Okay, now for the dark purple triangles

First measure the length of your laptop, divide that number in half... my number was 10cm... remember that number

Now find the center of the width of the laptop

Draw a line equal in length to half of your laptop (10cm for me) in this spot 

You should now have a sideways T drawn on your felt 

(is this making sense to anyone?)

Once you've done that, connect the end of your T, to each corner of your laptop... as shown in the picture above

Do this on both sides :)

Okay! Now you should have something like this drawn on your felt!

Cut it out!

Now, lay out your canvas fabric, so that the print is facing downwards.

Get one side of the felt all gluey and glue it down

Sorry about this photo too...

Almost done now people!

Cut out the canvas about 1 inch away from the felt

Wow, I should probably stop taking these photos in the dark

Then dab some clear nail polish around the edge of the canvas to prevent fraying and then fold down the canvas over the felt and glue it down

Tie a pretty ribbon around it to complete the package and there you go!

A learned a couple of things from this DIY...

first: Fabric glue smells TERRIBLE.... seriously, it's nasty... make sure to open a window or something

and  second: I should probably stop taking photos for my blog in the dark... my bad guys! Thanks for putting up with it!!

Anyways... we made it to the end of the week!!!! Yeee

Have I ever told you about my Stephen Colbert obsession? He's my hero :')

But that's another story for another time

Anyways... see you guys next week!

♥ Olivia