How to Make Your Own Concert T Shirt
An Easy Way to Make Your Own Concert T Shirt
The reason I know how to make your own concert t shirt is because I’m cheap. Seriously. Concert shirts are expensive and sometimes you just want to look the part. Here is a “hack”, if you will on making a shirt with your favorite band on it.
Finding the Right Shirt
First, you need to find the right shirt. The two pictured above, I found at H & M on the clearance rack. Places like H & M and Forever 21 are great because they always have inexpensive shirts in a variety of colors with no branding on them. Also, they are in the latest cuts and trends and typically fit in the style you want it.
Other great places to find plain inexpensive shirts like these are:
- Old Navy
- TJ Maxx
- Forever 21
- Ross
- Walmart
- Target
Once you find the right shirt, you need a few other things.
Equipment:
- Computer
- Printer
- Iron
Materials:
- Iron-On Transfer Paper
- Scissors
- Ruler
Making the Design
This part is the easiest part, especially now that we all have access to the internet. For the three shirts pictured here, I used this process.
- Google the artist or band in Google Images. In your search be specific. For example, “Nirvana logo” versus “Nirvana band”.
- Choose the image that you want with the largest pixels.
- Save it to your computer.
For this Janet Jackson shirt I googled all of her album covers, saved them all, resized them to match, and inserted them in a Word document.
Making the Shirt
When ironing on dark fabrics, the process is slightly different than light fabrics. For light fabrics, the design should be a mirror image and then you iron the image on faced down. For dark fabric, here is how you do it.
On Dark Fabrics
- Insert your design on a Word document and resize it to fit your shirt.
- Print the desired design on iron-on transfer paper for dark fabrics using an inkjet printer.
- Trim around the edges of the design.
- Peel off the backing.
- Place the design face up onto the T shirt in the desired area.
- Place a piece of parchment paper on top of the image. This should come with the package of transfers you bought.
- Make sure there is no steam or water in the iron. Slowly iron over the parchment paper for 20-30 seconds.
Remove the parchment paper and the image will be on your T shirt.
On Light Fabrics
- Insert your design on a Word document and resize it to fit your shirt. Flip it, so that it is a mirror image of the design.
- Print the desired design on iron-on transfer paper for light fabrics using an inkjet printer.
- Trim around the edges of the design.
- Place the design face down onto the T shirt in the desired area.
- Make sure there is no steam or water in the iron. Slowly iron over the back of the transfer for 90-120 seconds.
- Wait for the iron-on to cool down completely.
- Peel off the transfer paper.
That’s it… your own concert T shirt in a few simple steps!
