Re-designing Old T-shirts

As I started to clean my closets out I've found that I have a ton of cotton t-shirts that I probably won't wear again. Most of them are old race shirts.

I remembered poking around on Pinterest a while ago and pinning a few posts on how to re-design old t-shirts with ruffles and such.  I went back to my Pinterest board and clicked on the link but there were no directions on that posts. I searched for other posts that might have directions but none of them had designs that I liked, so I decided to just design my own.


To be honest, I wasn't quite sure how this was going to turn out so it never occurred to me to take pictures of the sewing process. I will just try my best to tell you how I made this one.

I started with a plain long sleeve t-shirt. This shirt was already in my "good-will" pile so I didn't mind if I messed it up or not.  This ended up being the perfect shirt to pick to re-design because it already had stitching around the seams.

I started with cutting the arm sleeves off. I kept the stitching around the shoulders and therefore I did not have to deal with raw edges.

After the arms were cut off, I cut them down the middle. I put the open sleeve through the sewing machine on a very loose stitch. Pulling the thread through the sleeve by hand creates the ruffle.

 You can tell that I cut the neckline to make it a V-neck instead of the crew neck that it was.
 Flip the shirt inside out to sew the ruffle on. Then flip the ruffle overtop of the neck line.
 I put a few stitches at the top of the shoulders to hold the ruffles down.

I've worn this top a few times already this summer and I'm sure I'll get more use out of it this fall as I wear it as a layering piece. I've had that shirt for probably 8 years now and I've worn it more times as a tank top then I ever did as the long sleeved top it was.


This was the first shirt I made out of an old cotton race shirt. This was actually a practice shirt, I will never wear this because I didn't use the proper colored thread to sew the ruffles on. As you can see, I sewed the ruffle on in a way that it covered up the decal that was on the upper left side of the shirts. It was also good practice.


When I started this project I was originally searching for how to turn a cotton race shirt into a tank top but all the designs I found involved raw edges on the shirt. I am not a fan of having raw edges on my clothes so that is why I decided to go with this style.  I am still searching for some other ways to turn race shirts into tank tops that I can workout in.  Do you have any ideas?  ~M

Do you ever re-design old clothes? Do you have good tutorial for turning race t-shirts into tank tops?

27 comments:

  1. That is absolutely adorable!! I wish I was this crafty :0)

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    1. Oh, but you are Lauren! I've seen some of the stuff you've made!

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  2. This is the cutest idea ever! If I only I was crafty and could sew….

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  3. Great job on both! I used to sew a lot and have been thinking I'd like to start again. This might be a good winter project!

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    1. Yes, it made me want to go through all my old shirts and re-design them. Definitely a good project for winter!

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  4. This is an amazing transformation, I would have never thought to do that to a regular shirt. I have seen a few ppl make old race shirts into tanks and stuff, but this is awesome!

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    1. Thanks Sara. I'm still looking for a good tutorial to make racing tanks.

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  5. OMG, you have some talent!! They are beautiful! I just sent all my old race shirts off to make a blanket. Someone else had to do it for me as I didn't do well in my home ec classes. :)
    @heatherlas

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    1. I actually taught a few home-ec classes in my day! I can't wait to see your blanket!

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  6. This looks great! I tried a design I saw on pintrest once to turn a large t-shirt into a more fitted tank top but it was a disaster :( And it did have the raw edges which I hated.

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    1. Yes, I actually had another t-shirt that I did not show that didn't turn out either!

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  7. Oh my gosh I am not in the least bit crafty so this is really impressive! Pinterest can show you how to do anything these days haha

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    1. I got the idea from Pinterest but there was no directions so I kind of made my own!

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  8. Looks like a great way to recycle shirts but I'm not crafty at all.

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    1. You should give it a try. You'd be surprised at what you can do.

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  9. I love how people take shapeless things & make them adorable... I wish I was talented enough to figure out how to do it. mine becomes just a WEIRD shape.

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  10. Adorable! I love the asymmetrical ruffles.

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  11. I have so many of these things pinned and I still haven't made any. Thanks for the reminder!

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  12. How cool! The shirt looks great! Such a fantastic idea...too bad I haven't learned how to use a sewing machine yet! :)

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  13. WOW! That is awesome, way prettier than my superhero shirts, lol! I am not this crafty. So cute though!

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  14. LOVE THESE!!!! I have heard of people turning t-shirts into fun blouses, but have never tried it. Seriously and I am not just saying this, I love what you did, so cute I should really look into trying this!!!

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    1. Thank You! I enjoyed making these and plan to do some more.

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  15. That's awesome! I'm always a little scared of sewing with knits, but your shirt is so cute, I have to try it. :)

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