Carry me - Book Review

 I'd been battling back and forth if this book would be worth it to get and finally just found it through my local library. My library is amazing that it connects to about 100 or more others so if they don't have it someone else can send it to my branch. Anyways back to this book. From the cover I could tell this was clearly a Japanese translation, their books just have this certain clean look about them. As much as I like Amy Butler's books and all their pretty colors it can also get me distracted from working on the project at hand. This book was also suggested by Interweave magazine so I thought it would be a worth a gander.

As expected from a Japanese craft book, even though it is translated it still has all the exact some clean beautiful photos. The detail photos are always important to me to see the pockets and notions used to make it complete.

I was very intrigued with this bag and it's multiple rivet's. In another picture it shows how the smaller bag clips inside the larger one with the rivets and some alternative strap and accessory attachments using the rivets as well.

Per the style of Japanese craft books all the pretty pictures are at the front and the meat and bones of the making is at the back of the book with a small picture of the project.  The instructions were very clean and direct with some nice illustrations to help understand where you are at.

 This book is perfect for someone who wants everything exactly step by step handed to them but a bit dry for the more creative person since it is very word heavy and all the illustrations are in black and white. But that is only half the book, the first half is still all the pretty pictures to inspire you.

Another nice thing is that all the patterns for the bags are included with the book. The Translated version is a bit different then how I am used to seeing them in the Japanese Craft books. Usually the patterns are all crammed into one sheet only identifiable by their different types of lines (dashes, dots, diamonds, circles, etc) and turned every which way. But in this translated version everything is laid out nicely such as a typical garment pattern would be laid out.

Over all I think this is a great book but if you follow them for materials you might have a tough time. Some of the bags require special notions that you can't just run down to Joanne's and get. These bags are also very nice and well made from good materials so if you want to do the exact project step by step plan ahead to be ordering some things online and that it might be just as costly in materials as it would be to buy a bag on your own. I think that can be said with a lot of nicer sewing projects though.

Not a keeper for me but I will be checking it out from the Library again so I can make the square bag and perhaps the rivet bag for my own personal uses.