Skirts from Shirts!

Whilst rummaging around in a box the other day, I found some shirts that I had purchased at the Sally Ann in Whitehorse a couple of years ago. I have a vague recollection of plans to cut them up and use them in a quilt. They were both men sizes 2XL.

“Hummmmm” I thought to myself, holding the shirt up to my hips. “I think I could make a skirt out of this!”

Here is what I did: I cut the shirt off under the arms. Then I turned the raw edge under about 1/4 inch, pressed and then hemmed it. Then I turned that same edge over again about 2 inches, sewed 3 channels, threaded 3 pieces of 1/4″ elastic through and voila! A waist band!

But when I tried it on, I wasn’t happy because of the shirt tail. It looked like a shirt tied around my waist. So I cut the bottom off so it was even all around, sewed a narrow hem and tried it on again. This time it was too short!

So I took myself to the fabric store and bought some black lace and some white lace and sewed it onto the bottom.

Voila! A skirt that I love!

On to Skirt number Two!Riding high on my previous success, I decided to tackle the second shirt. However, having learned my lesson about the too-short skirt (and not having any more lace), I dug around in the box some more and unearthed a piece of lime green denim that just happened to match the green in the plaid.

Again, I cut the shirt off below the arms. Then I made a waistband by cutting the green denim to the right length, folded it over in half and sewed it onto the raw edge of the shirt.I think a gathered waist makes me look thicker in the middle than I like, so I wanted this skirt to have a flat front instead of a gathered front.

To do that I sewed 4 channels only around the back (starting and stopping at the side seams). Then I threaded the channels with 1/4″ elastic.

The original shirt had a straight bottom instead of a shirt-tail bottom, so I didn’t even need to hem it! Bonus!

Two summer skirts on the cheap! Boo Yeah!