How to Make a Pencil Skirt Out of a T-Shirt

Turn an old, outdated T-shirt into a new and fashionable skirt.

Create a new fashion essential to show off your curves from an old, long T-shirt. You can make the skirt from a solid-colored T-shirt for a simple, demure fashion item or stand out with a colorfully patterned T-shirt pencil skirt. You can embellish the skirt with a ribbon hemline or waistline and add a decorative silk flower above one hip to add an exotic appeal to the skirt.

Things You'll Need

• T-shirt
• Fabric pen
• Scissors
• Sewing pins
• Sewing needle (or sewing machine)
• Thread

Instructions

1. Lay the T-shirt on your work surface inside out. Draw a line across the shirt just below the underarms and cut across the line. You do not need the fabric with the neckline.

2. Slide the remainder of the T-shirt on up to your waist, with the T-shirt hemline acting as the hemline for the skirt. Gather the sides of the fabric and pin them so that the fabric fits snugly. Take off the skirt.

3. Sew a straight stitch up along the pin line and remove the pins. Slide the skirt on again to make sure it fits well.

4. Cut off all but 1/4-inch of fabric beyond the side seam lines.

5. Fold over 1 inch of fabric along the top, rough edge. Pin it in place and sew around the skirt to make a tube. Leave about 1 inch of the folded edge open to insert an elastic waistband.

6. Measure the circumference of your waist. Cut a piece of elastic to the length and hook one end onto a safety pin. Slide the safety pin through the 1-inch gap in the fabric and pull it all the way around. Sew the elastic ends to the fabric and then sew the gap closed.

References

• "The Sewing Bible: A Modern Manual of Practical and Decorative Sewing Techniques"; Ruth Singer; 2009