Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Lace T-Shirt REDO



This is my Lace T-Shirt REDO. I have broke down how I made it with a few pictures to follow along my journey of how this came to be. 
So first off, I bought a really big shirt because I wanted it to be long. I laid a shirt that I wear on top of it and cut out so that I could get the right size. I wanted a little detail on the back so I cut it in half and added the lace and then sewed the back piece that I cut off  back together. (make sure you pin the lace to the t-shirt really good almost like basting a quilt so that your pieces stay where they are suppose to be. After I did the back I decided the front really needed some lace to. I played around with where to put it until I decided it just needed it all over. So I took out the shoulder seams until the ribbing and pinned the lace to the shirt front. I cut the lace around the neckline and zigzag stitch around the neckline  (very slowly so it doesn't bunch up) If you use a coordinating thread you hardly notice.
 The photo on the top left is simply to show a tip I use...I like to keep a scrap of fabric in my machine for when I am switching between sewing things. It saves my thread keeping it from getting unthreaded and using less thread because I can just push through the next thing I sew with a tiny bit of thread used. It is also great for when sewing something like knit. If you sew knit too close to the edge the sewing machine likes to eat it...if you know what I mean. So if you have a scrap already connected all you have to do when you start the next piece is give your scrap a little tough to help your feed dogs pull the beginning of your knit seam. once your feed dogs start pulling it through instead of down you don't need to tug anymore. That is my tip for this tutorial.

Now back to my shirt. I sewed my shoulder seams back and angled them a little to better fit me. Next step is to pin the shirt front and back together at the sides. I lined mine up at the armpit and pinned downward. The back of my shirt is a little shorter because I cut it in the back, but I like the way it looks it gives it a little slip detail on the sides.When you are pinning the sides together don't forget to pin the lace in you don't want to miss a layer.
After that I trimmed my lace around the armpit. I cut the sleeves out from the original shirt that I started with. Since I took up my shirt so much I knew my sleeves wouldn't fit so I thought it would be cute to gather them on the top. To do a gathering stitch you just increase your stitch length as much as possible.
Pull the bottom thread and it will gather. Then you need to pin right sides together the sleeve to the armhole. I start at the seam and work upward so that my gathering gets right on top. Once it's pinned you can sew it in place and when both are done so is your shirt.
The side slit detail can be finished simple by turning under the raw edge of the fabric and topstitching it. I finished all my seams with my serger. If you do not have on I highly recommend finishing your edges with a zigzag stitch so that your shirt doesn't unravel.

I hope this inspires you to do your own T-Shirt REDO!!