Taking on this bag was my biggest, most complicated and craziest project yet. I've been looking at this template for over a year. I was discouraged by the price, but eventually I gave in. If I had known what I was in for, I might have changed my mind. Leather consumption? Almost 2 m² - practically the entire skin of a cow. And the time estimate? I originally estimated 25 hours of work. How terribly wrong I was! Realistically, it was about 125 hours, and maybe a little more.

Just the preparation was a challenge. The cutting of the parts alone took over 10 hours. The laser has a working area of 40 × 45 cm, but the strap to the bag is 110 cm long. I had to cut it three times. Each alignment required manual aiming and a good deal of patience (and the hope that I would get it right). Well... I missed twice. But let's not talk about that too much. 😀

The dyeing was another unpleasant surprise. An incredible litre and a half of paint was applied to the whole bag! After it dried, I set about assembling the bag, naively hoping to stay within my original estimate of 25 hours. Cruel mistake. The sewing was much more challenging than I had imagined. When I finished the front pocket after the first day, I realized I had underestimated the size a bit. The original template calls for a 17" laptop bag, but I scaled it down to my 13.3". Only oops - my notebook, which I carry with me all the time, won't fit in the front pocket. Plus, I've been praying for days that my laptop would fit in there at all.

The biggest problem was at the back. It is already 2-3 mm shorter in the original template, which shifted the sewing holes. The result? I had to re-stitch the back three times before I managed to at least visually eliminate the error. And when you imagine doing most of the sewing blindly because you only have 6 cm of space in the pocket where you can't see, you can see why it was no fun.

And then it was the dragon's turn. Specifically, his wings. The wing membranes are sculpted in space, meaning three to four layers of skin crossed against each other. One wing took several hours to sew on. Scales? Another treat. Each scale is stitched in several places to hold the correct shape before being sewn to the bag. Plus, the scales are sewn one under the other, so sewing them on was like an endless marathon.

I decided that since this was a work of art, I would use airbrush. I hadn't had a color other than black in my gun for six years, but I finally remembered the color gradients. They made the dragon come alive, which you can see beautifully in the photos.

The strap was simpler compared to the bag. But only relatively - it still took about 15 hours of work, because there were twice as many scales on it as on the bag itself.

All in all, creating the dragon bag was an incredible challenge. The machine only touched the laser cutting of the parts, everything else was honest handwork. Two needles in hand and sew, sew, sew. The final price on the e-shop matches the huge amount of work behind this bag. But honestly? It was worth it. If you want something truly special, the dragon bag is for you. ❤️