Zeeko Salvage

Wofchuck's Cattail Cojongo Case

Our friend Mike Wofchuck is a professional percussionist. He brought us a Cojongo (wooden box drum) and asked us to make a traveling case for it. This bag is made from a whole bunch of different materials.

Lid in progress - brown hemp from German Army duffel bag, yellow fire hose, scrap leather, grommets in lid/handle are from duffel bag.

Upholstery scrap, fire hose, old cordura from camo duck hunting bag.

Hemp base, army surplus brass D-ring padded with scrap leather to keep lid clips from gouging drum. Fire hose cattails, and Japanese crane motif inkjet printed on raw canvas.

Cattails - Old waxed cotton tarp, fire hose, scrap leather, and ripstop poly/cotton from old cargo pants/uniform at my last job.

Binding the lid with army surplus webbing.

Finished product - front view.

Lid and side - olive strip on the right made from waxed cotton tarps that were the roof of Lauren Kennedy's family cabin for several decades.

Front view.

My aunt runs a business in Kansas City 'Asiatica' that repurposes vintage Japanese textiles. The crane is from a digital photo that I took of one of her old fabrics. We inkjet printed it onto some raw canvas and then steamed it to fix the dye.

Lid clip and cattail detail

Lid detail

Handle is scrap leather wrapped around hemp rope that used to tie the German Army duffel bag shut (thru these same grommets).

Lining is recycled Chico Bags donated by Mr. Andy Keller himself, thanks, Andy!

Satisfied customer

Filed under // fabric fire hose bags leather luggage printing the shop

Posted January 22, 2012

More Dragonboy-Themed Utility Belts

One week to our big show of the year in SFO and we are on a roll now.

Here are some more belt pouches using Dragonboy's art and our industrial textile collage.

These are sized for a 40oz water bottle. Smaller pouches hold an Iphone or other large phone, or a wallet, keys, lighter, and chapstick.

Materials include printed art canvas, printed cotton canvas, denim, fire hose, printed nylon mesh, jobsite mesh, leather, and repurposed camo shirts.

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Filed under // fire hose bags utility belts

Posted August 7, 2011

Fire Hose Corsets

Back into the shop!

We are finally in gear to build up inventory for the Burning Man rush.

Last year we realized that our friends in the City weren't very into our hillbilly camo collage cutoff shorts and coverall jumpsuits, but the fire hose utility belts and Mad Max body-armor fire hose miniskirts sold out, so this year, no WT theme. Just post-apocalyptic desert survival fashion... and CORSETS, of course.

Starting point - a dress form with duct tape mold/pattern.

Fire hose - this one is based upon a form that we made of our friend Katrina. It will have a separating zipper up the front when it is done, and optional/detachable hip pouches of the same material.

Lacing - the duct tape is for a pattern, and is not part of the corset.

We like our rivet details. This one has about 60 of them.

We can make one of these in any size, email us if you are interested!

We are going to be vending as part of a fundraiser party for the Chico Urban Artists Collective artcar project, at GRUB on 7/23 see you there!

Filed under // clothing fire hose bags playa

Posted July 5, 2011

Two shows to finish ADHD April

April is a wild month in Chico. A budding, blooming, creative explosion of lengthening light and lusty life. We were lucky/taxed to have two deadlines fall at the end of it - RayRay's 'Bike=art' show and Chikoko's 'Bizarre Bazaar'. We overextended and are glad that they are over! But we got to make a lot of new art - a spectrum from Bumblebee habitat boxes, psychedelic micro messenger bags, and rice harvester steel sunflowers to 'Opium Den' leather collage purses and fire hose totes. Here are some photos from the two shows.

Hillbilly yard art, firehose snakeskin samba belts, tough-mama firehose totes, and rake+ski pole garden diggers - our uncategorizable booth at Chikoko's Bizarre Bazaar.

Pulled together some new and old bags with a bike theme and decided to use my old chopper 'Pinkie' as a rack at the last minute. Welded a stand, loaded up the goods into the hemp panniers and rode it to the show. The bags on the handlebars are a new design that I am calling the MicroMessenger - they are big enough for a mini Kryptonite lock, cell phone and wallet; they have a loop to go on your belt, or we can add a traditional messenger strap and stabilizer.

Our hemp panniers and large and mini messenger bags - I added a new stabilizer strap to the messenger bags.

Stopped at the newspaper recycling shed at 6th and Flume to get some paper to stuff the bags with and found a paper bag full of old maps! Score! RayRay decided to put us in the window - I like what they did with the maps - they are prolific and amazing.

My folks were in town and pops took these photos - you can see him in the reflection, below.

Thanks RayRay and Chikoko. The RayRay show is still up in downtown Chico - make sure to go out back and look at Katrina's handmade longbike - she did a beautiful job on it.

Filed under // bike bags bike purses fabric printing fire hose bags messenger bags panniers rants shows

Posted May 3, 2011

The [Inbox] - Found materials

We are adding a new feature to our website - the [inbox]. We'll be tagging any posts about our raw (salvaged) materials with the [inbox] tag - giving you a chance to see where our finished goods come from.

We finally found a reliable source for used fire hose. Fire hose has to be pressure-tested every year, and the lengths that don't pass are usually dumpstered or sold to construction companies. This stuff was salvaged from an old army base - most of it has never been used. We sorted through a couple hundred rolls and found some with a great weight and a black lining.

the new, dreamy, black-lined hose makes up 95% of our new totes.

this mad max miniskirt is made from a heavier-duty cotton-jacket hose. this hose is a little too stiff and heavy for most bags, but it works great for playawear, guitar and samba-drum straps.

samba drum strap - double wrap, and available in custom lengths. triangles are leftover when we cut for the mad max miniskirts. $40 - email us.

we find a huge variety of colors and materials in hose and in the different linings. this hose washes to a demin blue, and the clear lining takes on an almost watercolored look.

irrigation hose (dark blue) and the nylon hose (above) make up this duffel and makeup bag combo. the zippers are brand-new salvage, found in a lot of 200+ at our local salvation army.

score! we are committed to using only high-quality hardware in our goods. our zippers are either new (salvage), or pulled from used bags that have minimal wear.

Filed under // fire hose bags inbox the shop

Posted December 29, 2010

World-traveler messenger bag

My buddy Andrew left a message that there was a big old classroom map laying in his alley. Made of about heavy rubber and about 5'x8' - it is big enough to make a whole series.

This first one is a Christmas present for my pops - who is half Norskie, and half Svede. Fire hose, old leather belt, and map, with inside file-folder pocket from a salvaged carryon bag. Let us know if you want a bag made with a particular geography. Get your continent before it is gone!

Filed under // fire hose bags luggage

Posted December 23, 2010

Fire Hose Handbags, Collage Messenger Bag, and Hip(ster) Pouches

Down to the wire for the Bizarre Bazaar this weekend, and we have been scrambling to finish all the random projects that we have started in the last few weeks.

Here are Erika's new handbags, a hemp and camo collaged fullsize messenger bag, and some small hip pouches that are big enough for cellphone, camera, and wallet.

Filed under // bike bags fire hose bags messenger bags utility belts

Posted December 9, 2010

Working with Leather

We have been collecting leather for a long time now - every time we are in Portland we go to Oregon Leather and pour through their scrap bins, grabbing upholstery scraps and various bits of hide. Erika used leather last year for her book purses, but I haven't really ever done much with it. Here are two new bags that combine what we have been doing with fire hose with some leather collage. In the spirit of salvage, these bags are made with cutting scraps from other commercial enterprises. Working with small scrap encourages us to collage and get efficient with the material, and these bags seem to fit with the collage theme for our holiday show.

After a couple of years wrestling fire hose with giant shears and industrial sewing machines, leather is pretty dreamy to work with.

Medium-large purse - concho bling from Guadalajara Mexico.

Sewing binding onto leather collage

Strap uses a gorgeous belt from Mona and Seamonster's Yard Sale

Thanks Mona!

Flap detail

Front detail

Filed under // fire hose bags leather

Posted December 6, 2010

2010 Messenger Bags

We are getting ramped up on our large messenger bags for the Chikoko Bizarre Bazaar. We are making 10 each small, medium, and large bags. Here are some details from the large ones.

We love details. Being a custom, one-off kind of shop, we can spend the time on the sorts of details that get cut out of a cost-cutting mass-production operation. We are using camstraps backed with heavy fire hose to connect our straps to the bags. The camstraps allow quick adjustment right at the front of the bag, and they cinch and hold like no other buckle.

Batches of ten. Ten is a good number. Not so many that you get bored sewing the same detail all day, but enough to really notice some efficiencies in production. The black webbing on the buckles is from a thrift store dog leash. Buckles are new.

This years' bags are almost 100% synthetic fire hose. We scored some nice light stuff this fall, and all of the trim, pockets, and body are recycled hose.

Panel ready for trim, hardware, and sides. Our large messengers are larger this year, 19" wide, and 1" deeper than last year - big enough for most large laptops.

Powered by Chai, and art-spired by DragonBoy. Buy fresh, buy local! See you at the Bizarre Bazaar!

Filed under // bike bags fire hose bags messenger bags the shop

Posted December 2, 2010

New designs for 2010 holiday season

Here are some new bag designs. Erika has a new line of large purses made from black-lined fire hose, and I (Zeke) am working on some collaged small and medium-sized field bags. Materials in the shop right now include red Cordura and black rubber from a large ski bag, mylar printed with Hindu comics, a big 'Hawk Skate Wear' vinyl banner from a skateboard store, 1,000 feet of amazing black-lined fire hose (going fast) and our usual camo army surplus shirts and hemp duffel bag yardage. Also, we are working on some larger fire hose messenger bags. We'll be slinging everything at the Bizarre Bazaar in Chico December 11-12, and some of them are posted on our Etsy website.