DIY: front tie, tie-dyed tank top

Hey guys! So today I'm going to show you how to upcycle an old t-shirt into a cool front tie, tie-dyed tank top! It's also a good idea to wear an old shirt while doing this so that you don't ruin a good one with dye.

Materials:

• Old t-shirt
• Fabric scissors
• Dye
• Rubber bands
• Garbage bags
• disposable gloves

Step 1:
Decide how high you want your shirt to be on your waist and mark this with a sharpie.Once you have this marked, approximately find the middle of the shirt. Now you will leave about 4 inches on either side of the middle and mark this now 8 inch gap on both sides with a sharpie.

Cut the front and back of the shirt on side until you reach the line that marks the gap and repeat this on the other side. When you get to the line continue cutting straight across on the back but do not cut the front. Once you have the back cut, draw lines on the fabric hanging down on the front of the shirt so that it looks like a triangle.

Once you have the triangle cut, cut the hem off of the bottom if you haven't already. Now cut a strip up the middle and round the ends so that you have two pieces that can be tied together.

Step 2:

Cut the sleeves off of the t-shirt to your desired depth and thickness. Then fold the shirt so that you can use the sleeve you already cut as a guide for the second sleeve.

 I cut my sleeves fairly deep because I want to have low sides so that I can wear a bandeau with this.

Next cut the collar however you would like. I left mine high and didn't cut it much deeper than the original collar because I like the high collared style for tank tops.

Step 3:

This is the fun part! Now you get to tie-dye the shirt. These steps show how to do the spiral pattern but you could google other patterns if you don't want to do the spiral.

You may need to soak your shirt in soda ash depending on the type of dye you use. I had to soak mine and I let it sit in the soda ash for twenty minutes. After it has finished soaking, cover the area where you will be dyeing the shirt with a garbage bag. Don't forget to put on your disposable gloves!

Pinch the shirt in the middle or wherever you want the center of your spiral to be. 

Now turn the piece that you pinched clockwise while keeping it tight. It should end up looking like this:

Now secure this ball with rubber bands. You can use however many you want; I used three. 

After you have the ball secured with rubber bands, begin tie dyeing the shirt. Decide how you want to dye it (alternating colours, etc) and begin to dye each section. Make sure that you push the dye into each piece fairly hard so that you won't be left with too much white. 

(I know the lid is on, it's too hard to actually dye it and take pictures at the same time lol).

After the top of the ball is done, flip it over and repeat on the side that was sitting on the garbage bag. Remember your pattern and make sure you're dyeing it the same colour on this side.

Step 4:

After you finished dyeing both sides of your ball, cut the rubber bands and leave the shirt to set. I just put mine in a plastic bag and left it for about five hours. After the dye has had a fair amount of time to set rinse it out and then wash it. After you have washed the shirt rinse it once more. The water coming off of the shirt should be close to clear now. You may want to wash this separate from other clothes in the washing machine for the first few washes so that you don't ruin other clothes. 

That's it! Now you're done and you have a super cute new tank top for summer time! :-)