Posts Tagged ‘knot so fast’

A Spot of Tee: Maker Faire Edition

This past weekend we were at Maker Faire, a 2-day celebration of technology, engineering, sustainability, and DIY — and amidst the visual and aural feast of mechanics, explosions, and high-pitched frequencies, there were many a slashed T-shirt for me to spot! Starting with this one (to be fair, this young lady spotted me first — turns out, she’s a fan of Generation T, and recently hosted her own Tee Party at home!).

SPOTTED:

Where: New York Hall of Science, main entrance
When: September 2012
What:
Skully Tee
Key accessories: Black T-shirt and denim — and a Maker Faire day pass!
How do I get the look?: Melody used this entry on the Generation T blog to make her Skully Tee the very morning she was headed off to Maker Faire — it’s that quick and easy!

SPOTTED:

Where: New York Hall of Science, lower level, at the Tracimoc (that’s comic art, backwards) table
When: September 2012
What:
T-shirt totebags
Key accessories: Your arm, with this bag hanging off your elbow. (And some Maker Faire loot, perhaps?)
How do I get the look?: Try the grocery tote from Generation T: Beyond Fashion — perfect for toting books, groceries, or that Halloween haul.

SPOTTED:

Where: New York Hall of Science, near the Maker Faire food trucks (see, there are an actual feast to be devoured, too!)
When: September 2012
What:
Slashed long-sleeved T-shirt
Key accessories: Puffy vest (you know, to make up for the body heat lost through those “shoulder vents”)
How do I get the look?: Follow the instructions below, from project #10, Shoulder Slash, in Generation T.

SPOTTED:

Where: New York Hall of Science, making the rounds
When: September 2012
What:
Fringed T-shirts, knotted T-shirts, laced T-shirts, slashed T-shirts on the members of Batala NYC, the all-female reggae percussion band!
Key accessories: Drum sticks.
How do I get the look?: For the fringe look, follow the instructions below for project #4, Fringe Benefits, from Generation T; for the slashed look, follow the instructions above. Add knots, beading, and lacing as desired.

SPOTTED:
Okay, it’s not technically a T-shirt, but these leggings just seemed so T-shirt-inspired…

Where: New York Hall of Science, outside the Maker Square tent
When: September 2012
What:
Slashed and woven leggings
Key accessories: Pink ankle socks
How do I get the look?: Snip parallel horizontal slits about 1″ apart along the outside fold of the leggings on each leg. Cut slits as high as you need to for your skirt or shorts to cover. Use a T-shirt cord (cut the stitching off a T-shirt hem, and strettccchhh it out) to weave through the slits, tying a knot at each link of fabric.


[ Comments Off on A Spot of Tee: Maker Faire Edition | Posted on October 2nd, 2012 ]

From Our Readers: Maria & Franz!

Earlier this summer, I got an email from my brother and sister-in-law with the subject line “T-shirt Guru, Help!” Maria and Franz are two musicians on an adventure along the Trans-Siberian Railway. Like any good musicians, they travel with merch, and like any good merch-peddlers, they run out of stuff fast. So they were down to two XXL T-shirts and quickly discovered that their fans were tending to come in smaller sizes. Maria writes…

“Franz and I have two XXL T-shirts left of one design and people much smaller than XXL keep expressing interest, but then balk at the size. We have a long train ride coming up, so I started thinking about trying to convert the shirts into cute, cut-up T-shirts. My sewing abilities and supplies are limited, but we’ve got decent scissors, safety pins, and a travel sewing kit. Can you recommend an easy-ish pattern that we could sell to a punky Russian girl?”

How could I ignore such a request? A few cross-continent consultation emails later, Maria and Franz had set up shop: They’d been crashing with some cute punk gals in the outer boroughs of St. Petersburg, and set up a workspace on their kitchen table. Armed with a pair of scissors, and that travel sewing kit, they set to work transforming their merch. Measuring and marking…

Cutting…

And knotting. Ta-da! It’s the “Knot So Fast” (project #104) tank top from Generation T: Beyond Fashion.

Sveta, one of the aforementioned cute punk girls who was looking on, was suspicious of all the scissor activity, but once she tried on the completed result, she asked if she could keep it, so, it seemed to be working. Nothing like converting a skeptic!

Then it was time to tackle “Outer Lace” (project #16) from Generation T.

And then they set off in search of one of the Russian editions of the two books, should any additional emerchencies arise.

UPDATE from the road: “We just sold the last of our Generation T-styled Franz Nicolay shirts to the fashionable women of Orenburg Russia. Thanks for the designs!”

[ Comments Off on From Our Readers: Maria & Franz! | Posted on September 14th, 2012 ]