DIY T Shirt Dress

A Summer of No Pants.

I love this idea.

Not sure I could pull it off  but, I’d like to honor this movement with a refashioned t- shirt dress.

I started with this thrift store shirt which I had already taken in to fit before I took the picture.

Oops. But believe me, it was huge.

I love the neckline and of course the stripes.

I bought a yard of black knit fabric for the bottom of the dress. Cut it to size being sure to leave room for gathering, seams and a hem.

Then, on your shirt, measure and cut where you’d like the skirt of the dress to start. Be sure to leave a quarter inch for the seam.

Next wrap a piece of elastic to desired tightness under your bust and cut to size leaving a half inch for a seam.

Now stretch this elastic out to full stretch to measure how big you want your casing pieces. Cut two pieces of the black knit that are twice the width of your elastic. I used 3/4 inch elastic so my casing pieces were 1 1/2 inches wide.

Sew 1/4 inch seams at the end of each casing piece.

Sew your skirt piece together at the side then mark the sides and the middle of the front and the back. Also mark the sides and the middle of the front and back of your shirt.

Now, gather the top of the skirt using the highest tension and the longest stitch on your machine. Leave nice long threads at the ends so your gathering won’t slip out when easing the fullness to fit onto casing pieces.

Sandwich the gathered skirt between the two casing pieces, ease to match sides and middles, pin and sew.

This is where it gets a little tricky. Right sides together, sew bottom of shirt to the top of the front casing piece only.

When you turn it right side out it will look finished.

Then turn the dress inside out, fold up the inside casing piece, pin and sew along the top edge to form the casing for the elastic. Leave an inch or so open to thread the elastic.

Use a safety pin to thread elastic through the casing.

Measure the length of your dress and hem.

This dress really needed a belt.

So I checked out the belt section in the thrift store and found some perfect refashioning opportunities.

I started with this buckle I had saved from a previous project.

I removed the buckle from this pink elastic belt.

And combined the two for a great new look.

The great thing about black and white, you can accent with almost any color.

I think yellow would be a nice accent color, too.  Maybe that will be my next refashion project…. a yellow belt.

I used this same technique when making this outfit last December.

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