Make a T-Shirt Dress for One Dollar

I want to show you how I made a t-shirt dress for one dollar and we’re not talking about a dollar from Zimbabwe. I get the greatest ideas for things to make  just by looking at crafting blogs and then  looking through my craft room. That is how I decided to make this easy-breezy dress by taking a t-shirt which I bought at a dollar store for, of course, a dollar and some fabric which my best friend gave me when she was thinning out her stash. I love it when she does that because I’m the first one she calls to ask the useless question, “You want this? Well, duh!

T shirt dress for a dollar

I thought about making this dress with an old t-shirt I already had in the closet, but it didn’t match any of the fabrics I had in my stash, so I went out and paid the dollar for a new one. I know how unlikely it is for me to splurge, but this once I did and I don’t regret it. I’ll show you how to make your own T-shirt dress.

What you need:

T-shirt (you can pay whatever you like for it)

1-2 yards of stretchy fabric (how much you need depends of how full and long you want the skirt)

Regular sewing notions: thread, scissors, needles, sewing machine, pins

Instructions:

1. Decide where you wish the t-shirt to stop and the skirt to begin. Normally you would pick the natural waist line–I did– but this is your dress and your design so if you want a drop waist or a high one, it’s your call.

2. Whatever length you decide for the shirt add an inch for a seam allowance and cut the rest of the t-shirt off.

3. Decide how wide or narrow you want the skirt. Hold the fabric around your body to see how you want it to look. I wanted a flirty, full skirt so I made it twice as wide as the bottom edge of the t-shirt. Trim any extra fabric leaving an inch for seam allowance.

4. Choose the length for the skirt. I chose knee-length, but you can go longer for a maxi look or shorter for a mini look. Trim the fabric to the length you wish the skirt. Make certain you leave an extra inch at the top for a seam allowance and an extra inch at the bottom for a hem.

5. Sew the fabric into a tube leaving  a few inches at the top for gathering.

6. Fold the bottom of the skirt a half inch twice and sew. This makes a nice tidy hem.

7. At the top of the skirt, sew two lines of basting stitches for gathering the skirt, if it needs it. To gather, gently pull the bottom threads until the right width to match the bottom of the t-shirt. Make certain to gather evenly. Then sew the seam shut.

8. With right sides facing, pin the skirt to the t-shirt. Then sew.

9. The additional step I took in making this dress was to add a matching trim around the neckline with a bit of extra fabric from the skirt. I removed the old collar which was too tight for my liking. I made a scoop neck and I just sewed on a little strip of fabric folded in half and wrapped around the t-shirt material at the neckline. As I never had done this before it took a few tries before it looked nice enough for my liking.

Pipping around collar to match skirt

That was all and I had a nice little dress, carefree to wear and easy to care for. Just wash and dry and it’s good to go. I liked it so much I’m planning on making more of them and each one of them will be a dollar or less to make. I have a slew of t-shirts in my closet and tons of extra fabric just waiting to be made into something fun to wear and which can easily become my next t-shirt dress. Really, you ought to try it.

The finished t-shirt dress

You can make matching t-shirt dresses this way for mom and daughter/granddaughter, nieces or cousins. The mommy and me look is so cute and they make great frugal gifts. Hope you make your own t-shirt dress for a dollar. It’s fun and they are fun to wear, too.

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Glory Lennon is the ultimate pack rat and quite proud of it. It enables her to use her imagination to come up with new ways of using what most people call junk and that includes recycling old denim jeans. She’s got examples of this at Glory’s Garden in the Craft room.