Stripy T-Shirt Refashion

I saw this lovely top in very nice department store a few weeks ago.

It's from Dickins & Jones, it's very lovely, and it's £35. Ah.

I already had this stripy Breton t-shirt.

It was a bit too short, a bit too wide and it has 3/4 sleeves. I may have mentioned before, I don't really "get" 3/4 length sleeves. Surely it's either cold enough to need your arms covered or it's not! Anyway, this top has it's faults but it is a really nice quality thick jersey fabric.

I scoured our local Charity shops until I found this little beauty for £1.99:

Ideally I wanted red but pink is nice too. The fabric is a nice thick quality, not quite as thick as my white/navy stripe but almost. The neck is soooo tight, I had to undo the buttons just to get it over my head, but perfect for a t-shirt mash up! 

The pink T-shirt was a good width on me, you can see here how the white top is too wide:

You can also see here the white top has a slightly wonky front edge:

I chopped about 4 inches from the bottom of the white top, straightening it up. That's the good thing about stripes like this, it's easy to get things straight. That brought the bottom of the white top to just below my waist level which is where I want the coloured stripes to begin.

Next I sorted out the "too wide" issue with the white top.

The easiest way to do this if it's not too massively ill fitting, is to put the top on inside out. Then just pin two new side seams (one each side) where you want them to be. Now take the top off carefully so you don't stab yourself. This can be done with safety pins if you are clever and sensible.

As you can see this only needed to come in an inch or so:

I stitch down these seams, but on the left side I left a gap of about 2 inches at the bottom edge, like so:

This gap is so I can attach the pink border on the bottom.

I cut a 7 1/2" wide strip from the bottom of the pink t-shirt, and then cut off the left side seam to make one long rectangle. I did not photograph this stage. I have no idea why, sorry, you'll have to imagine a long rectangle of stripy pink and white fabric. The old bottom hem of the pink t-shirt will become the bottom hem of the new top, no need to make work for yourself!

Next I attached this long pink rectangle to the bottom of the white top.

Right sides together, I lined up the two intact side seams and pinned - the picture shows it better than I can describe:

I then carefully pinned the pink strip to the bottom of the white t-shirt. Do this carefully, making sure the pins match the strips on both sides, Stripes are good for following when you are cutting or sewing straight along them but if you make a mistake it will show!

On the left side seam on the white top - where I left the gap, it looked like this:

This is where I started and finished stitching my carefully pinned seam, joining the two pieces together. I used a very slight zig zag stitch as this is jersey fabric.

Then I just stitched up the side seam. Next I pressed it all with the iron then gave the join seam two rows of top stitching so it now lies nice and flat. 

Next extending the sleeves.

The 3/4 sleeves on the white strip top are 9" wide and 7.5" too short to reach my wrists. So I cut 2 rectangles of the remaining pink t-shirt 9.75" x 10" (this allows for a hem at the wrist and seam allowances)

I turned one long edge and gave it two rows of top stitching to form a cuff. 

Next I turned the rectangle into a tube by sewing up the long edge leaving a 1" seam allowance and then turned it right side out.

I just slid the tube into the white top sleeve, lining up the seams and pinned it in place. At this point I tried it on to make sure the sleeves were the right length, then attached these new sleeve extensions with a simple row of top stitching.

Julie

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