Keeping with our current theme of getting ready for a vacation, I decided to make a laundry bag. Mesh fabric is very popular currently, and the colors are bright and fun. What better fabric is there to make a laundry bag – particularly if your vacation includes packing a bathing suit? A laundry bag made out of mesh fabric will allow damp items to air dry. – no, not when packed in a suitcase – this is not magic fabric, it is mesh fabric.

Supplies:

½ yard of 60” wide nylon mesh for the lower bag panel – the green in my case
¼ yard of 60” wide nylon mesh for the upper bag panel – black
1 ½ yards drawstring cording
scrap of water-soluble stabilizer (at least 1 inch square)

Construction:

From the top mesh (black in my sample) cut a strip 36” wide x 9” high.
From the bottom mesh cut a rectangle 36” wide x 18” high.
Pin the top mesh panel to the bottom mesh panel along the 36” edge.

1. Using a 1/2” seam allowance, sew or serge the panels right-sides together. For your meshes, this may seem to be an ambiguous statement, but the fact is that my black mesh does not have a right-side and the green mesh does have a right-side.
2. Finger press the seam towards the bottom panel and topstitch along the seam to secure the seam in the facing down position.
3. Fold the panel in half right-sides together to form an 18” x 26”  rectangle. There is always a right-side for this step. The raw edges of the joining seam must be out.
4. Sew along the bottom and side with a 1/2” seam allowance. I changed thread color to match the mesh.
5. If you do not like the look of raw edges on the inside of your bag you can use a serger or do a french seam finish. (See the tutorial on how to do a french seam in the pillowcase blog posted on January 22, 2013.)
6. At the fold in the top mesh, opposite the seam just sewn, mark 1/2” on each side of fold and 1” down from top edge.  The center butterfly pin along the top edge in the photo is the fold line.

7. Place water soluble stabilizer on the wrong side of the mesh. Remove pins before sewing a buttonhole.

8. Following the instructions for your machine, sew a 3/4” horizontal buttonhole 1 1/4” down from the top raw edge and between the vertical pins.
9. Cut buttonhole open.

10. Trim away excess stabilizer.

11. Fold down top raw edge 1/2”. Finger press and secure with pins.
12. Fold down another 1/2” and pin.
13. Edge stitch along the inner fold all the way around to form the casing.
14. Attach a safety pin to one end of the cording and feed through the casing.
15. To prevent cording from pulling out of casing, sew across the casing on the side with the seam.
16.  The excess water-soluble stabilizer will dissolve when held under running water.