Up-cycling a Vintage Suitcase

Found this sturdy little suitcase in need of some work.  The plan is for it to become a sort of "go bag" for supplies. This should be able to accommodate everything I could need when sewing away from home.

It did not start out looking like this. First it really needed a serious cleaning.  The outer shell was covered in these black marks that cleaners would not remove....BUT did you know that hairspray is a secret weapon for these sorts of marks?...it cleaned up great! (as you can see in that first photo)

Next I had to tackle the interior.......it was rough....real rough.

I tore it all out and tossed it away.

now, I needed to rebuild the interior. Wanting create some structure, I used buckram (I had a roll of it left over from my costume building days)

Next, I created  fabric covers for the bits I had fashioned

Covered buckram was also used to create the "hinge"

Wanting to make sure that the top's interior would not pull away, I placed the elastic that runs through that shirred pocket all the way around. I added an extra piece of elastic to help hold things in place and created some loops of sorts that I may want to clip small items to.

This is how the back of this piece looked, wrapped around a piece of foam core and made so that it fits very, very tightly in its spot to help keep it secure

everything was firmly adhered using doubled sided carpet tape.

I am quite pleased with how it turned out.  All that remains to be done is to gather up the variety of supplies I want to live in this case.....ready to go at a moments notice.