T-Shirt Vest Tutorial

I decided that making one of those trendy vests that you see everywhere going for like $20 is an easy make so I made one with a t-shirt I had laying around. I totally plan on making an edged out version of this vest later when I get the materials to do so. What's super awesome about this vest is it can be a sew or no-sew vest and there are millions of different ways to make it unique.

Every guy has tons of these under-shirts laying around, so steal one from your boyfriend/dad/brother whomever, they won't notice and make this cute vest!

Begin with a men's L or XL t-shirt of your choice.



Cut the sleeves off of your shirt. If you are going to be doing the sewing part of this project keep your sleeves for later.




Cut the excess hang off of your shirt.



Cut the back of your shirt into a racer back.




Remove the collar of your t-shirt. If your t-shirt isn't a v-neck like mine is cut yours into a v-neck.



Cut your shirt down the center.



This is probably the most complicated part of this project. Start at the bottom of the front of your vest were you cut in half. Cut above the hem of your shirt and remove the hem cutting your vest in a curve so that it is shorter in the back than it is in the front.

If you are not sewing this project then you are so done and can rock your shirt as is. But if you want to jazz your vest up then continue below.



(optional) Take your sleeves from before and get ready to cut them into pockets. I basically just folded mine in half and cut them into the desired shape. It's important for you to keep the hem in-tact though.



This is the shape I went with for mine. You can do whatever shape you like.



Carefully cut two little slits through the top layer of your hem where the little lines are.



Using a safety pin run ribbon through the ends of your pocket hem and out the little center slits.



Pin your pockets to your vest being sure to turn the edges under so that you have a clean line. Sew your pockets on.



Tighten and tie your ribbons. Your pockets should look something like this.



(optional) To add a little edge to your vest, sew a zipper down the center back.



(optional) I chose to sew lace down the back of mine.

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Easy Peasy H&M inspired Dress

So while browsing the forums at Threadbanger I saw this awesome sauce dress that someone wanted to know how to make.



It was by H&M and was being sold on ebay. The measurements provided were 60" bust and 38" long. I decided this would be an easy piece of work.


To start off with you're going to need your fabric of choice- the great thing about this dress is you can use any type of fabric you like and it will work.

I used a non-stretch cotton.

Lay your fabric folded in half as such.(The Pink/Red line is where your folds should be)



Fold in half again this time folding it the new long way.



Now you are going to need a long-sleeved shirt. Lay this shirt folded in half along the new fold.



Cut where your head hole should be. Since my material isn't a stretch material I went back and cut my hole a bit larger than what you see in the picture.



Next you are going to lay your sleeves along the top of your fabric.



Now here is where it gets a bit tricky because you have to measure how far in you cut your sleeves. The original dress had a bust of 60" and I have a bust measurement of 33" so the 60" bust worked for me. With that in mind your dress should be 30" wide on the front and 30" wide on the back and since my fabric and yours should be folded in half that makes for a 15" front. This left me with about 5" for my sleeves.




I lay my measuring tape from the center fold to the edge of the fabric and cut to the 15" mark.



From that mark I cut straight down.



The next thing you will do is flip your dress inside out and hem the sleeves and the collar of the neck.

Once that is finished you will sew along the outline of the dress (you will sew along the bright blue lines)



The last thing you will do is hem the bottom of the dress.




Finally the only thing left to do is to belt it and wear it!











I suspect I will go back and add pockets to my dress just for something a bit more whimsical.

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