Box Bottom Bag Lining Tutorial

Make a roomy, box-bottom bag lining, complete with a pocket! It’s easier than it sounds, and this tutorial will walk you through it, step-by-step. Try it out in the Classic Cables Tote Bag pattern!

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Bag Along CAL

The bag shown in this video is the Classic Cables Tote Bag pattern. You can find the full written instructions for the bag in that pattern.

This is the fifth of 6 bag patterns in the 2022 Bag Along CAL. See the full schedule and learn how to join in the fun, in the main Bag Along CAL post.

Get the pattern here!

What is a Box Bottom Bag?

Sewing a front and back panel together gives you a flat bag with no depth. Cutting and folding the corners creates that depth, by stealing a bit of width from each panel to make the sides. The math seems a bit complicated at first, but is actually relatively straightforward

Adjusting the size

The video shows the 14 x 14 x 3 inch bag lining for the Classic Cables Tote, with 1/2 inch seam allowances. But you can use this same method to make a box bottom bag of any size. Here are the calculations you’ll need.

Panels

Using a 1/2 inch seam allowance as shown in the video, each panel has the following dimensions.

Width = width of bag + depth of bag + (2 x seam allowance)
Height = height of bag + 1/2 depth of bag + (2 x seam allowance)

So for the 14 x 14 x 3 inch bag with 1/2 inch seam allowances, each panel is 18 inches wide by 16.5 inches tall.

Box Bottom Corner

To make the boxed bottom, you need to cut out a square from each bottom corner. Each side of this square = 1/2 the depth of the bag – seam allowance. For this bag, that works out to 1-inch square.

Measuring the corner for the box bottom bag lining

Pocket

The patch pocket can be any size you want it to be, as long as it fits in the bag. To make placement easy, I made mine 1/3 of the width of the panel, plus 2 times the seam allowance. In other words, 6 + 1 = 7 inches.

Whatever you want the finished length to be, double it and add the seam allowance. I kept it simple and cut my pocket piece out at 7 x 14 inches.

Featured in this Video – Knit Picks Mighty Stitch Worsted

WeCrochet provided the Knit Picks Mighty Stitch Worsted yarn for the Classic Cables Tote Bag design shown in the video. The blend of acrylic and superwash wool is strong and squishy, with a subtle sheen, and comes in a wide variety of colors.