We all have our favourite T-shirts or those shirts that maybe we have outgrown. Don’t just give away those T-shirts, repurpose them. You can repurpose shirts that even have rips or holes in them. Depending on where the rip or hole is will determine what you can make with it. If it has a big hole or tear in the main body of the shirt I would suggest using it to make a headband. If the hole or tear is in the sleeve or small near the bottom edge or near the neckline then you can repurpose it into a cute bag. I am going to show you how to make a no-sew t-shirt bag. This is a simple project that can be completed in 10 minutes or less. You can choose to make it with hanging tassels or a streamline tote bag.
Material required: Scissors, old t-shirt
Step 1: First, make sure your t-shirt is washed and dried. If it’s an old shirt this way you won’t have to re-wash it after. For a new t-shirt, you will want to wash and dry it so if there is any shrinkage it will occur before you cut it. This will ensure the final product isn’t out of whack once completed.
Step 2: Now that the shirt has been washed and dried, lay it out flat on the floor. Make sure to match up the two body line seems to ensure the shirt lays flat.
Step 3: You will start by cutting off the sleeves. Depending on how long of straps for your bag will determine how low you cut the sleeves off. I followed the sleeve seam line about one inch in from it.
Step 4: For the other sleeve, I did the same thing following the sleeve seam line about one inch in from it. This should work for most shirts unless you want really long straps.
Step 5: Now you will need to cut out the neckline from the t-shirt. There are various ways you can do this. For those that have done sewing or crafting with scissors for a while, you can probably free-hand it. This is what I did about four inches in from the natural t-shirt neckline. If you have never done anything like this you can use a large bowl or bucket and lay it over the neckline a few inches from it then trace with a fabric pen or permanent marker. Then cut the neck opening out. Note if you plunged your Sleeve cut lines down further you will also want to plunge your neckline cut down as well.
Step 6: Now that the top part has been tended to we need to cut the bottom of the t-shirt. You will cut the shirt into strips, I did mine in strips about one-inch wide. You will do this all the way across the bottom of the t-shirt.
Step 7: Now you need to decide if you want your bag to have the bottom tassels for your no-sew t-shirt bag like shown above or more clean line like below.
Step 8: If you want it to have a more clean line bottom of the bag then continue following this tutorial on how to make a no-sew t-shirt bag, I chose the clean line. If you want to have tassels hanging out skip this next step and don’t turn your t-shirt inside out.
