Lunch Box

Hello!

Fili here! I intended to write this post last week but I had to postpone it since we need to prepare our next event. I'm going to talk about our latest finished custom order, a lunch box with thermal lining.

Our customer requested to use a laminated Kokka fabric as the main fabric. It's quite a challenge to sew this one, the laminated fabric wouldn't move forward when I tried to sew it on the machine. I tried a few tricks until  I found that the fabric must be sewn with the wrong side in the bottom or sew the fabrics together with other parts so the laminated side won't stick.

In addition to that, sewing the thermal lining was very challenging. I must resew it several times to make the lining fitted. The thermal lining also looks pretty easy to tear apart, it only consists of a thin aluminium like sheet and some sheer foam. It doesn't have any fibers or grain, so I have to be very careful when sewing it.

This is the photo of the inside:

The lunch box is smaller than the previous one that I made, so I used a single handle on top instead of two handles in the front and back side.

That's it, see you next time!

Fili&Lino

Hand Stitch Practice

Hello, Fili here :)

I had a little problem with my sewing machine a few days ago: the thread was a little loose every time I sewed thick fabrics. I checked the sewing machine parts, cleaned it, changed the needle but the problem was still there. Probably it's because my sewing machine is already very old. After several times failed to top stitch a bias binding, I thought it's time to give it a rest and do a hand stitch instead. I still haven't mastered the technique to create a neat and flawless hand stitch, not to mention it takes me hours (two to four hours!) to do a hand stitch.

And this is the result of my hand stitch:

It looks better than before, isn't it? The valley and hill weren't as rough as before (see my previous hand stitch) and I must practice sewing faster.


That's it, see you later!

Fili&Lino

More Q&A with Fili&Lino

We got some questions from our latest instagram giveaway, and now we're trying to answer all the questions!

1. Are you going to have a tutorial on how to make your plushies/dolls?

Not at the moment. We have a huge list of custom order and Fili isn't really keen on having another plushies in her room.

2. What about your eito song fabric, have you made something from it?

So far only a three panel wallet.

3. How long does it takes for the trial and error before you launched your new model/products?

Depends on the product. Usually within hours for small products (pouches etc), 1-3 days for totes, and more than that for rucksack/backpack. The learning process itself is not stopping there. Usually every time we make the same product, we keep on learning something new on how to make the product much better and efficient.

4. If you find a model that you like somewhere, how do you figure the pattern? Do you buy it and open it?

Please bear in mind that we will never buy someone's product and open it to learn how to make it. Nope. Never. What we do is we just try to figure it out without even touch the model. If we found some model that we like from books or pinterest, we just try figure it ourselves. If we stuck, we try to find the tutorial somewhere online (google is our best friend, and so does pinterest). If we couldn't then we just think, do trial error. Besides, if you've been making bags/wallet/pouches for years, you'll learn that the basic are pretty similar, it's just the small modification here and there that makes it different.

5. What's your flagship product?

Not sure. The recycle? Wallet? Lunch bag? Probably recycle.

6. What makes you different from other crafters out there?

Hmm, we think we're pretty similar with other crafters: we do this because we like it. But we have special interest on the pattern and colours of the fabric. The tone, mix and matching, we put a lot of effort on that area. We are also very strict on deciding what kind of fabric that we're going to buy. We aim to have a more unique pattern. That's why it's pretty hard to find shabby chic/flower fabrics in our products. Probably something fun, quirky sometimes, but not too flashy or too much? We already tried printing our own fabric and the response is pretty good. Hopefully we can have more original print fabric in the near future.

Hope this answers! Feel free to drop any questions on our instagram, facebook, e-mail, and twitter!

Fili&Lino

Blue Sneakers

Hello!

We had a fun project to make a set of billfold wallet, a make-up pouch, a small pouch and a pencil case using plain navy blue fabric combined with Geekly Chic Sneakers Blue fabric.

Marketday Display Agony

Hola everyone!

So Fili&Lino is going to have a pretty big even in the next three months. Our problem now is the booth display (beside our other main problem: production itself!). I've been lurking all over the web, and I'm in love with wire baskets or wire display. Something like this, this, or this. The problem is, I don't know where to find it in Jakarta! I've been to various shops and nope. The closest thing to these are at Scoop, but the wire basket there is so damn expensive!

And you may already know that IKEA is now open in Jakarta (well, Banten Province to be exact). So I thought, why not try find something there, especially when I pretty much fed up with Ace Hardware and Informa. And I found some stuff that I really like: a brand new RISATORP trolley (it's not even on their cataloge and website yet). Believe me, it's pretty big, not like in the photo. Pretty pricey, it's almost IDR 1 million (80USD) here, but I can imagine it will look pretty nice with our pouches etc. I'm also thinking of having one of their LACK long low table, for additional display if needed.

So, any idea where I can find an affordable wire basket here? And any thought about our product display? Where can I find good quality stuff for display that doesn't kill our bank account?

Lino

ps: HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR! XIN NIAN KUAI LE!