How to Make a Pretty Recycled Pocket Purse

by Craft Invaders

30 Minutes

Easy

Periodically we have a clothing cull in our house. The kids grow like weeds, and I think we are all pretty hard on our clothes.

Making a recycled pocket purse is a really fun way to recycle old pairs of jeans into something new! I’ve been wanting to try using bleach on a fabric project for a while now, so this seemed the perfect opportunity.

My daughter used textile paints on her recycled pocket purses, as it seemed the more sensible option for a 7yr old.

We gathered all our bits and pieces together. I used thick household bleach for this project, and was careful to wear gloves and an apron. The stamps I used where little cheap rubber stamps – I washed them well after use, and they appear to have survived the bleach unscathed!

How to Make a Pretty Recycled Pocket Purse

First we cut out our pockets from two old pairs of mens jeans. Next time I plan to experiment with different fabrics – this would certainly work with any cotton pockets. I also cut scraps out of the jeans and tried stamping on them first.

I poured the bleach onto folded up kitchen towel as I wanted to be able to load my stamp without saturating it. As you can see in the picture I also used the rubber on the end of a pencil as a impromptu stamp! Once the bleach had done its job to my liking, I popped the pockets through a wash to remove it.

My daughter used a combination of paintbrushes and foam stamps to get the pattern that she wanted. Our textile paint required ironing and then running through the washing machine to fix.

Here are our pockets once they had been washed and dried – we were really pleased with our results. I over-stamped one of the bleached pockets with a black ink to help pick out the flower shape.