In this video I will show you five epic DIY t-shirt ideas, which will help you upcycle
your old shirts into amazing tops and get you all ready for summer!
Hello everybody! Summer is just around the corner and I'm so looking forward to it. Long
sunny days, swimming in the sea, short sleeves - I miss that very much! But talking about
short sleeves, you do need a lot of cute and stylish clothes this summer. And don't worry
if your closet is full of boring t-shirts because I'm here to save you. In this tutorial,
I'm going to show you how to transform plain t-shirts into the cutest tops and shirts that
you'll love. I came up with four, actually five designs that I can't wait to share with
you, so let's just get into it. First we are making this adorable panda tee
with lace out of a plain white t-shirt! Mine happens to have the adorable word on, but
no problem if yours doesn't. For the lace edge you will need a piece of lace and a fabric
glue. I went for hot pink lace to add some color to the shirt and we are just going to
glue it along the bottom edge. Flip your shirt inside out and place a piece of cardboard
between the back and the front of the shirt, to prevent them sticking together while gluing
the lace. Apply some glue along the inside edge of your shirt and place on your lace,
that's how simple this is! This DIY literally takes 2 minutes and adds so much to a plain
t-shirt! One side is done so turn the shirt around and keep adding more lace until the
entire bottom edge is nice and lacey. There we go! Now just leave the glue to dry for
about 20 minutes and you can flip the shirt around again to see the beautiful result.
My shirt still has a lot of blank space so I decided to draw a panda design on as well.
Here I am just sketching the panda's eyes, nose and mouth. For the eyes we need two large
oval patches, a cute little heart for the nose and we are also going to add little pink
cheeks to this sweet buddy. Inside the black patches we need to leave two white circles
for the eyes. So I am just sticking a circled piece of masking tape there.
Place a piece of cardboard inside the shirt. This will make it easier to draw but will
also prevent the color to transfer on the back of your shirt. And now we are all ready
to start coloring our lovely panda bear. With this technique you can also make other cute
animal tops, like a cat or a mouse. These are just so easy to make and they look absolutely
adorable! Nose is done, now on to the mouth. I am using black and pink fabric markers to
match the lace. Lastly I am drawing two pink ovals below our panda's eyes. This makes him
look even cuter but also connects the lace and the panda design together into the prettiest
shirt ever. This shirt really went from nothing special to most adorable shirt I have in my
closet. I am so happy with the result, I kinda want to draw such Kawaii animal faces to all
of the shirts I own. Keeping the rest of my outfit simple I paired it with black denim
shorts and some white lacey sneakers.
Oh Yeah!
Time to transform this long shirt into a gorgeous lace heart fringe top. You'll need a shirt,
some lace, a heart stencil, self adhesive paper, fabric glue, scissors or an exacto
knife. Cut a heart out of your stencil. Place it on the self adhesive piece of paper, outline
with a pencil and cut it out. Place the cardboard inside your shirt to make
sure that you will only be cutting the back layer of the shirt. Take your exacto knife
and trace the shape of the heart to cut your heart out. There you go you are left with
a pretty heart silhouette window. Flip the shirt inside out and take a piece of lace
fabric. All we have to do is stick the lace on the shirt. I like to dot a small amount
of glue all around the edge and then press the lace on as I go. Let the glue dry completely,
mine takes about 20 minutes and then you can flip the shirt around again to reveal the
awesome lace heart that we have just created! Cut away the excess lace and we're done! I
think it looks so beautiful and I love how easy this is to make.
Ok, first half of our shirt transformation is complete, but we still have to make a knotted
fringe bottom to give this shirt a summery and flirty vibe! I am sticking a piece of
masking tape on as a guide up to where I want my fringe to go. My shirt is very long so
I also want to cut away some of the length. If your shirt is shorter to begin with you
can just skip this step. Star cutting the tassels up to the leading piece of a masking
tape. For a simple fringe top you can just leave it like this – it already looks super
cool, but I will show a bit more special fringe design by knotting the fringe pairs together.
Before that, let's give our strands a little tuck so that they won't look as freshly cut.
Place a piece of a cardboard between the front and the back layer of your shirt and we are
ready to start knotting! Knot together the tassels all along the shirt, making the knots
as high as possible. Just like that... the front is finished. Now we have to repeat the
same steps on the back. Knot together two fringe strands and move on to the next pair
until you have knots all around your shirt. Next row of knots needs to be bit lower, so
I am sticking on a piece of a masking tape as a guide. Now you have to take one fringe
string of the first pair and one of the second pair and knot them together, making a knot
below the masking tape. Take the remaining string from the pair two and one string from
the pair three and make a knot. And so on until you reach the end of the row. I will
knot the back later so here I am proceeding with the row three. Grab a string from the
pair one and string from the pair two and tie a knot about half an inch below the row
2. take the remaining string from the pair 2 and string from the pair three and make
a knot. Continue until the third row is finished. I decided to make four rows of knots, so this
is my last one. I love how you get this pretty crochet detailing with knotting the tassels.
If you want your crochet part to be wider, go ahead and make more knotted rows. I think
four is just enough for me. I also knotted the back strings and this is how pretty the
top looks in the end. I love how the tassels give so much movement to the outfit and make
it look so interesting and full. I am so pleased with the result!! If you want you can cut
away the excess fringe but a – a, I decided to keep mine because I love the t-shirt to
pieces already. I paired my top with some light washed skinny jeans and sneakers that
have blue stars all over. Some brown sandals or wedges would go perfectly with this outfit
too for a more romantic, bohemian look.
Here I am going to show you how the shirt looks if you decide to cut away the excess
fringe strings. I happen to have an exact same shirt only that this one is pink, and
I am going to repeat all the steps as before with the blue one. Here is a little stop motion
movie of the process. Actually I get a lot of questions how I do the stop motion for
my videos. It is really simple, all you have to do is take pictures or a second clips of
the process. So I make one knot, film for a second, then I make another knot, film for
a sec, make a third knot, film for a sec and so on. When you put all of that footage together
you get a stop motion movie. So here we have finished our knotting and it's time to cut
away the excess tassels! Just make a horizontal cut below the fourth row of knots. Voila,
we got ourselves a beautiful cropped croche top, which I think looks gorgeous. See how
you can get a completely different top with just one simple step, in this case cutting
off the fringe. Since this top is shorter I like wearing it with more high - waisted
bottoms, like this skirt.
This t-shirt is probably 10 years old but I love the color, the graphic so I never wanted
to get rid of it. However the fit is ... horrible. So let's pimp this baby into a cool shirt
full of interesting cut-outs! We need a shirt, scissors or an exacto knife a thread and a
needle for a couple of stitches, ruler and a masking tape. First we are making a braided
detail along the neckline. So trace with your pencil, sketching where you want your braid
to be. I will be using my exacto knife for the cuts so a piece of cardboard inside the
shirt is a must. Now start making one to two inch cuts crossing our sketched line. You
can totally use scissors for this if you don't have an exacto knife. Continue making these
cuts all along the neckline. Now what you want to do is take the first two strands and
tuck the second one under the first one. Pull the second strand up, take the third strand
and tuck it under the second strand, pull the third strand and take the fourth strand
under it and so on all along the collar. I actually saw this design in a shop not long
ago and I thought "hey" I could do this myself, but I've also seen a lot of other cutting
designs recently and such unique tops are always so expensive. I just have two strands
left and my braid is finished. Now we have to secure our braid. Thread the needle and
make two to three stitches so our braid is locked and it ain't going nowhere. I also
decided to make a couple of stitches on the right side just so that the opening won't
be as big. But that is totally optional. Also if you'd like you can cut away the collar
of your shirt, but I decided to keep it, because it kind of looks a bit retro and old school.
Let's now make a cool triangular cut out all along the back too! Don't forget to put a
piece of cardboard or other material inside the shirt, especially if you'll be using an
exacto knife. When I see things like this in shops I always take a picture and then
I can film a video and me and you guys can rock this cool shirts for way cheaper. High
five! For the guide I like to stick two masking tape pieces in a V shape like so. Now we have
to cut horizontal cuts between both masking tape pieces. I am using a knife, but scissors
work great too. OK, once all the cuts are made, remove the masking tape pieces and start
braiding in the same way as before. Take the first two strands and tuck the second one
under the first one, pull the second strand up, take the third strand and tuck it under
the second strand. Pull the third strand and take the fourth strand under and so on. In
the beginning this is a bit more difficult because the strands are so short but it gets
a lot easier when moving up. Here is my braid all finished so all that's left for me to
do are a couple of stitches to secure it! Try to use the thread in the same color as
your shirt so that stitches won't be visible. Yay! We're done with this cool back cut-out!
We're not completely done yet, though! I decided to snip away the sleeves to get a nice sleeveless
top. I'll also make it a bit more cropped by snipping away about two inches from the
bottom. Now... I'm happy with it - my top is all done so let's quickly put it on! I
paired it with some distressed light washed jeans, blue sneakers and cool glasses for
a real tough girl look, haha! I really love how after ten years I can again wear this
pretty shirt. This is the whole point of upcycling clothes, giving life to pieces you totally
forgot you have.
Last, but definitely not least, let's transform this plain white long cami into a cool graphic
top with tassels and beads. For this DIY you will need a longer white top or a T-shirt,
a star shape print out, self adhesive paper, scissors, fabric paint, plastic container
to put the paint on, sponge applicators, beads and a pencil.
Start by cutting a star shape from your print out. Place it on the piece of self adhesive
paper and trace the silhouette using a pencil. We are doing the same thing as we did with
the heart top, remember? Cut the star out of your self adhesive paper and here's your
stencil for the shirt! Stick your shape on the center of your top, like this.
Time for the exciting part – fabric paint! I decided to go for two colors, a blue and
pink. Start off with the blue one. Dip a rounded sponge applicator in the fabric paint and
start making big dots on the edge of the star. The purpose is to cover the edge almost completely
and then make gradually fewer and fewer dots as you move away from the star. Let's now
add some pretty pink dots on the empty spaces. Also, as you can see, the dots on the edge
should kind off go a little bit over the star, so that when you remove the sticker it will
look like there's an explosion of colorful dots behind the star silhouette. Time to remove
our star stencil and reveal our cool design! I can tell that it will look absolutely amazing!
See, I told you! But we are not done with this top yet. We
still need to make a beaded fringed bottom! Cut away the bottom hum and then start cutting
thin vertical stripes up to the masking tape. I am cutting my front and back fabric together
to save me some time. Now this already looks pretty awesome if you ask me, but we still
have to add beads for an even more amazing detail to our top. Before proceeding, give
your fringe a nice tuck to get rid of the freshly cut look. This part is basically similar
to the lace heart top, but the fringe will be different, because we'll be using beads
instead of knotting the tassels together. Take your hama beads or other beads of your
choice and cut them using scissors. This will make it easy to thread them on the fringe
as you can open the bead like so.
Take two fringe strands and slide a bead on. I am using scissors to help me open the hama
bead and slide the bead on the tassels. Continue making these beaded pairs of tassels along
the entire row until all of your front fringe is grouped in pairs. For the second row, you
have to take one tassel from the first pair and one tassel from the second pair, add a
bead, and slide it a half of an inch lower than the first row of beads. Continue doing
this along the entire row. Make the third row using the same technique. Take one fringe
string from the first pair and one from the second pair, bind them together by sliding
on a bead. Then combine the remaining tassel from the pair two with one tassel of the pair
three and so on until you end up your third row. Repeat these steps on the back of your
shirt and you are all done! See how absolutely out of this world awesome this tasselled design
looks. I am so happy with this top I can't even explain it! So I'm just going to shut
up. No, I'm not, haha. Fringe is a huge trend this season, I have seen it all over the shops,
but I don't even care what's in and what not, because I love fringe every summer! Fringe
tops just look so fun, happy and flirty. Perfect for the hot summer days. Here I simply paired
mine with some yellow shorts and white sneakers, because with a top like this you don't really
need much more.
With all of these beautiful shirts and tops we're now all ready for the warm summer days.
Hope you'll try them out and if you do so, please send me pictures on my Facebook, Twitter
or Instagram. Also don't forget to check out my DIY shirts and shorts tutorials from last
year for more summer clothes ideas. Let me know in the comments, which today's short
was your favorite and also what videos you would like to see next.
That it is for today, thank you so much for watching, I love you to the moon and back.
Bye!
Take a look at the back of your closet, I am sure you will find old shirts that can
be pimped into beautiful unique pieces, which you will love to wear for years to come.