A newbie's attempt at altering his shirt...

[slicedbread]

Hey there guys...I've decided to start trying to learn how to sew and so with absolutely no knowledge whatsoever I grabbed a shirt that was ridiculously large in the chest/waist/arms area and attempted to slim it down to size...Of course, it turned out a total mess, but I learned a lot from it...The finished product I think actually looks quite pleasing, but it's very tight on me...I figured that I could post up pics as a form of encouragement for some who are toying with the idea and also for everyone else to have a good laugh at my feeble attempt at sewing...

The shirt was originally 50 inches in the chest with absolutely no taper.

I have not measured the end result, but it's a little smaller than 36 inches as it's tight on my 36 inch chest...

And here are the pictures...As I progress I will take more detailed accounts of exactly what I've been trying to do and will try to compile it all into some sort of journal of progress =)

Before:

After:

 

[cowboy76]

Hmmmm,...human sausage eh??

 

[dakotanorth]

Resizing a shirt?

Hmm, looks like you darted in the sides right? Did you reshape the underside of the sleeve or take in the shoulders at all?
Altering a shirt is one thing but resizing it is another- most of the major areas change in size, PROPORTIONALLY. IF you only do the torso, then you get a medium shirt with large sleeves.
I've seen some dirty tricks though that work and don't require a complete rebuild; namely, taking up the seams along the sides and around the sleeve by simply sewing a new line parallel to the existing one. You get a big seam on the inside of the shirt, BUT you can generally press it flat with the iron.
I'm glad to see you practiced on a shirt that wasn't priceless or unique- I learned that one the hard way.

Jp

 

[BellyTank]

Put your toys away!

B
T