Passport Cover

Because I felt like I had wasted an entire week of sewing effort (read about it here), I decided that I needed to whip up something quick. I needed some instant gratification to appease myself. I had purchased some cute Kokka fabric on sale last week with the intent to make some passport covers, so I decided this was the perfect thing.

I used the passport sleeve tutorial at bunnybum as a basic guide. I constructed one cover as directed, but decided that it didn’t have enough structure. I then tried to make one with both the exterior and lining pieces interfaced, but it was too thick for my machine to handle the top-stitching. I then settled on interfacing just the exterior piece. The original pattern calls for each piece to be 12 x 6 inches, but I made it 13 x 6 to account for the added bulk from the interfacing.

I also modified the construction of the cover. She tells you to top-stitch around the entire cover and then fold over the interior flaps and top-stitch again. This creates overlap in top-stitching on the top and bottom of the cover, which I think looks a bit messy unless you can line them up perfectly. Instead, I top-stitched the sides of the cover only, folded over the flaps and then top-stitched around the entire cover. This prevents the double stitching problem and ended up with a cleaner look.

As for the fabric, the exterior is Kokka Trefle Travel Bags in natural and the lining is Heather Bailey Nicey Welcome Road in olive. This cover is going to be a gift for Ashwin when he finally gets his passport. I plan to make a second cover for myself. I have plenty of Kokka fabric left so I will probably whip up some luggage tags and possibly other travel accessories.

Happy Memorial Day!