Man shirt refashion: asymmetrical tucks top with shirred back

Since I started following sewing blogs earlier this year, I got fascinated by refashioning men shirts… My goal is to try a new technique every time. So here is a new attempt which is also part of my two summer projects… Summer Essentials Sew-Along and Wardrobe Refashion.

It all started with wanting to try shirring and creating a top out of this shirt.
It seemed so easy to do from this shirring tutorial that I finally gave it a try. I must say that’s it works like magic… the sense of accomplishment is great. I shirred 5 rows using my machine foot as guide for the distance.

Then I got this idea of creating asymmetrical pin tucks…. so I simply pinned the fabric creating some lines by standing in front of the mirror (I don’t own a dress form).

Since I wanted the shirt to have some 3D feeling to it… I simply didn’t iron down the resulting pin tucks. By the way, they are sewn with a straight stitch, 1/4″. Given that I was not following any specific pattern when creating the front design, I freely adjusted it to my body shape.

Regarding the neck opening… I originally wanted to create a boat neck (which you still see at the front), but then I started playing with a V-shape at the back.

I used dark blue thread for the neck and shoulders to create some contrast.

I left the bottom and side hems as they were in the original shirt…so no additional work there.

I also reused part of the stitching from the arm area by cutting just one inch above the underarm stitching… Have a look at this fantastic tutorial by Kirsten which is also where I got the inspiration for turning the shirt around.

So… all in all a nice and quick project to do…The only down side is that ironing this shirt is not so easy… as you might notice from the wrinkles… believe it or not that shirt was ironed before taking the pictures (which can also mean that I am lousy at ironing….)

Have you refashioned shirts lately? I would love to see your projects.