Want another fun, easy way to dress up a basic tee? Look no further than this week's tutorial! Use your favorite city's skyline, plus some dye, to make an ordinary tee spectacular!
You'll need a black fabric marker, some dye, an old paintbrush, and fabric (or a pre-made tee).
I'm starting from scratch with this project, mostly because it's easier to embellish a flat piece of fabric than a finished garment. (It's also a lot easier to start over if you make a mistake.) And, I really wanted an excuse to make up the Liberty Jane baseball tee...
First, I cut out the front of my tee. Then, I used chalk to mark off the bottom of my skyline, making sure to leave some room for the hem later on. I marked the approximate top of the skyline with a pin.
I found a picture of the Seattle skyline on the internet, and started drawing it on the tee. It's a good idea to practice first on a piece of scrap fabric!
If you don't feel like freehanding, you can also lay your fabric over your inspiration skyline, and trace. Tape both the image, and the tee front, to a window, to give yourself a little helpful backlight.
When you are happy with your skyline, protect your tee front with a press cloth, and iron it to heat-set the ink. (Your fabric pen probably came with directions about how to do this, but 30 seconds at a med-high heat is usually a good bet.)
Next: the ombre wash!
I got my tee front thoroughly wet, then daubed on very concentrated dye with my paintbrush, and let it sit for a while. It looks really dark and intense in this photo, but a lot of it rinsed out, giving a very delicate look instead. How dark a color you get, depends on the fabric you use, how concentrated your dye is, and how long you let it sit.
In any case, be sure to give it a gentle wash in detergent, to get out any remaining dye molecules, before drying and heat-setting it again.
Finally, all that's left is to sew your beautiful new shirt front to the other pieces of the tee.
Thanks for following along, and have fun with this!
For Pixie Faire,
Melinda
169 Comments
My favorite city is a tie between Los Angles and Seattle. I love Los Angles because of the Groove, which has fabulous stores to shop at (including the 2 story AG Store.) But I also love Seattle, especially in the fall when all the leaves are falling and it has such beautiful colors!
-Valerie
Seattle is my favorite city because my Granddaughter lives there. It is so exciting to have
her and her Am Girl show me her new town. It also has a wonderful skyline.
My favorite city is Phoenix because we chose to live here 23 years ago, but Seattle has my heart now too, as my son chose to live there nearly 10 years ago! I LOVE your baseball shirt and can’t wait to make one (some?)!!! Would treasure this shirt if I were lucky enough to win it, Cinnamon!
Thanks again for all you do for all your fans!!
My favorite city is London, because it is the skyline of Mary Poppins! We are talking “Mary Poppins,” here! The most magnificent movie ever, with the most beautiful skyline filmed in history! She’s floating above the city on a cloud in the opening scene…Plus, there’s the scenes with Bert singing and dancing on the roof tops! Who can resist all of that!!!! Oh my goodness! It’s just Heavenly!
My favorite city is Fort Worth TX. My Grandma lives there.