[Sewing Tutorial] -- Body Suit From a Band Tee

what's up my seam Queens my Bros that sew and my Dems that hem today I'm going to be teaching all of you how to make a sexy little bodysuit out of a simple band t-shirt our supply list is going to be a little bit more lengthy than some of my other projects just because we're going to do snaps at the straps and at the crotch that way if you're at a concert and you got to use a porta potty you can get in and out of it without having to get completely naked which is always a plus the bantee that I used for this tutorial is from the zabelian triangle they're a symphonic death metal band from Texas if you like all the music that you're hearing in this tutorial it is from their album the banks at the Rubicon in the link below you can find their CD and you can also buy a t-shirt from them and if you prefer to stream on Spotify or just to download the album and listen that way you can also find it there [Music] foreign paper or you can use like old newspaper any sort of sheet of paper that you can trace out a design on doing a one-piece bathing suit to trace my pattern you can also use an existing bodysuit that you have or you can kind of get creative and use a combination of a tank top and some underwear that fit you well but that one might require figuring out the length so you might need to test the pattern a couple times and I'm just laying it out flat and tracing the pattern and as you can kind of see it kind of sits a little wrinkled so I'm just kind of stretching it out as I trace the pattern so I get the exact shape of this garment [Applause] s now I'm folding over the back side of the bathing suit to trace the front because it's a little bit of a higher cut than the back is one thing to remember when you're making a pattern too is that this item that I'm making a pattern based off of is a very stretchy material and if you're working with a band t-shirt that doesn't have a lot of stretch to it you're going to want to give a little additional seam allowance or you're going to want to back the bodysuit with a very stretchy spandex fabric instead of the back of the T-shirt fabric I'm just making all my curves Smoother by using these pattern drafting tools that I got off Amazon and I'll have a link for those in the description below using your craft scissors go ahead and cut out your pattern foreign you want to leave a seam allowance which is enough space to where you can get a stitch in there so the Garment is not too tight you can either mark this on your pattern by tracing just outside of the pattern that you made or you can just remember to cut a little excess when you're cutting out the item that out of fabric now I'm just tracing the back of the Garment [Music] foreign I also made sure to label my pattern front and back so that way when I'm using this in the future I'll remember which is which now just like with the front I'm reinforcing the curves and making them nice and smooth with these pattern drafting tools and a quick double check on the width on the straps [Applause] come back once again cutting out the pattern with my craft scissors not my sewing scissors now I'm going to lay out my shirt as flat as possible and with the design as centered as possible I'm going to lay my pattern down with you can use pattern weights or you can kind of pin it on there I'm double checking the distance from each side of my pattern to the logo on the shirt this is a good way to make sure that your design is centered now I'm tracing my pattern with a watercolor pencil you can also use Taylor's chalk double checking that measurement just one more time to make sure everything's good and I'm gonna take it out a little bit on this side [Music] and take it in a little bit on the opposite side just to even it out now I'm using fabric scissors to cut out the pattern I'm not cutting through the back of the T-shirt either and it should look something like this to make up for the stretchiness from the pattern that I used I'm actually not using the back of the band t-shirt even though it was very soft and stretchy I want a little extra stretch so I got this nice stretchy black cotton fabric [Music] now that I have those pieces cut out I'm going to roll the seams along the top for a nice finished look you can skip this step if you want but I think that it really adds a nice touch and if you're going to be adding the rivets at the end this is going to give you a nice thickness of fabric that's going to let those sit in there just right [Applause] so I'm just folding it over once and then a second time and then pinning in place myself most of sewing is a lot of cutting measuring and pinning and a little bit of selving foreign [Applause] Pro tip I can offer too is have all your pins facing in the same direction it's going to make it a lot easier when you're running it through the sewing machine foreign place I'm going to repeat the same process with the back of the bodysuit [Applause] [Applause] now that those are pinned down it's time to sew them in place I'm using a reinforced straight Stitch so that way it has a nice little bit of stretch and give for you know getting it on your bust or moving around you could also do a zigzag Stitch if your sewing machine does not have a reinforced straight Stitch if you're new to using a sewing machine think of guiding the fabric through not forcing it through the machine and the foot will do the work for you you're just making sure that it's on the right path [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] now we're going to sew snaps on the crotch I just bought some snap tape like this but before I do that I'm going to go ahead and pin up the sides of the bodysuit so I'm just lining up both of my edges and just laying pins down now I'm going to turn it inside out and I'm going to pin and place these snaps that I'm going to use there's one side that kind of pokes out like a nipple and then one side that snaps into it and you just want to make sure that you snap them together after you pin them on the Garment to make sure that you put them in the proper place you want them to lay flat and smooth when they're snapped together just like you would on a bodysuit that you would buy at the store so just double check after you've pinned it in place that it snaps like you would want it to snap on the finished garment just like that exercise now let's sew all this in place I'm starting with a reinforced straight Stitch to go down the sides of the bodysuit and I'm also going to do a zigzag stitch for a little extra reinforcement [Applause] [Applause] excited now for sewing the snaps in place I'm going to use a straight Stitch going one way but along the edges where I had trimmed the snap tape it's a type of fabric that'll start to fray so I'm just using a zigzag Stitch to keep it from fraying [Applause] [Music] [Applause] if you want you can also skip this step and just sew the two crotch seams together but you won't have a snap in out feature on your bodysuit so if you have to go to the bathroom then you're gonna have to get completely naked to get out of your body suit [Applause] [Music] now that that part's done it's time to make some straps if you want you can just buy pre-made straps and put those on or you could just use elastic or even I've used the bottom uh seam on a T-shirt and just folded it over and sewn it for that but I want to do my signature faux leather straps on this so I've cut a long strip of faux leather and a nice long piece of elastic and I'm just folding over the faux leather on that and pinning it in place [Applause] I'm just doing one long continuous piece but I'm going to cut it into two and use it for the straps now I'm just sewing it down with a straight Stitch since this is a thicker fabric sometimes you'll have to do things like change the type of sewing noodle you use change the foot on the sewing machine or just change the thread tension depending upon your machine and what kind of fabric you're working with foreign I've cut it in half and I'm going to sew it onto the back of the bodysuit first not the front it's much easier to get the adjustment trying to pin it in the front of your garment than it is to try to reach around and pin it in the back I'm just double checking that I've put it in the exact same spot on both the left and right side just by folding my garment in half and double checking that they need at the same place and now I'm just sewing the straps on using my sewing machine [Music] now I'm going to sew the O-rings onto the front so I'm just measuring either side from the armpit seam up and I'm pinning them in place folding over that fabric and pinning them in place now I'm just going to double check that it looks even on both sides by looping the straps through them and pulling them nice and tight once those are nice and tight I'm just double checking that the O-rings are meeting at the same spot that not one of them is sitting higher than the other I'm also cutting the strap length a little bit shorter and I'm double checking the measurement on that just to make sure that those are going to be even and pinning them in place oh my God I'm always very fickle about measuring several times after I pin things in place but everything looks good so now I'm just sewing down the O-rings to the front of the bodysuit but I'm Not sewing down the straps yet and sew down the straps if you want but I like to add these little metal snaps to them it makes it really easy to get it in and out of and it also makes it adjustable so I'm getting my little snap pieces ready here there are four types of pieces for the snaps in total there's two that are going to make up the front of the snap and then one that is going to make up the back of the snap the seller that I buy these from has sent a nice little picture that works great as a guide so I would definitely recommend getting your snap pieces from mikas Margo I'm using some measuring tape and a little bit of Taylor's chalk to Mark even spaces where I'm going to put all my Snaps and my rivets I'm going to use my sewing awl to poke holes through that way I can set the snaps through and I'm making a hole on two sides of part of the strap so that way I have somewhere to put the inner and outer pieces of the snap I'm getting my first set of setting tools for setting the outside of the snap the outside snap part is going to look like one of your rivet caps with this little concave piece underneath foreign end and then I'm going to put the other piece on the inner part just like that I'm going to set it using my tool [Music] I find with the snaps it's better to press a little bit more gently and then if you need to set it a little bit more firmly give it another little press with the tool rather than to over press the first time and set it all wonky and then have to sew new straps on I'm setting two of the outer pieces on each one that way I have two adjustment settings so if I want it to sit a little bit lower I can or if I want it to sit a little bit higher I can [Applause] there are also hand tools for setting these but I find that the press works a lot better foreign now that I have the outer pieces set it's time to set the inner pieces so I'm going to change the little dies in my machine and the thing that you want to remember when you're doing this is which way you want the the other piece sitting up so that they snap together so the post is going to feed through the same way that it did on the outer piece so you're going to feed the post through it's going to be sticking up on the same side and then you're going to put this weird little I don't even know how to describe the shape of that tool but you saw it in the video side by side and just like the other one I'm gonna press it firmly yet gently in place and then see how it just speeds through and snaps right into place there and we're just going to repeat the process on both straps adding another one of these on each side [Applause] Not Dead was always [Applause] myself [Music] now I'm switching out my tools so I can add some flat rivets I have ones that are the exact same size as the snaps so they're gonna disguise perfectly with them these rivets are two pieces like you've seen in a lot of my tutorials where there's a little post that looks like a nipple and then there's a cap that goes on top so you just feed the post through the back of the strap and then place the cap on top and press until it snaps and once we have all these snapped in place we're going to go ahead and set them with the Press you can also use a hand tool if that's all you have handy but like I said before I prefer the Press [Music] [Applause] and I'm setting the cap side down and the post side up and just firmly yet gently pressing down with the press tool got all these in place [Music] [Applause] and lastly I'm gonna add these brown little rivets along the bust line it's one of my favorite little ways to give a simple project an extra little bit of flair taking my sewing all and very gently just poking the a small hole through it you don't want to jam the sewing all all the way through otherwise you're going to have too big of a hole and the post will come out of the back just like I did with the rivets on the straps I'm putting the post side through the back and then I'm setting the cap over top of it and pressing until it snaps in place and repeating the process all along the neckline now I'm going to use my press tool I'm going to set the cap side down into the press tool and just firmly yet gently press down on the press tool now you could wear this as a finished project but I wanted to give it a little bit extra so we're going to add some slashes to make this extra sexy I'm using a pattern drafting tool just to kind of give myself a little guideline and double checking my measurements to make sure it's even on both sides before I start cutting the slashes I'm just going to make it even on both sides of the crotch and the booty seam [Music] s now I'm just making little slashes going all the way up trying to make mostly even space in between and you don't have to make these slashes super super thin I'd say I probably make them like between a half inch to a quarter inch wide because once you start pulling them and braiding them in between each other they're going to stretch and get more narrow [Applause] just give them a little tug to stretch them out and now I'm just going to do this little kind of I describe it as like a little stepladder technique where you're kind of reaching up underneath the last one and then pulling up the next strap and then pinning at the very top [Applause] [Music] I actually have a really good clip of this technique in my braided and slashed leggings tutorial which I'll link [Music] and I'm just going to cut into this just a little bit more so it looks even on both sides [Music] now that that side looks good it's time to move on to the back [Music] and I'm drawing the shape that I want I'm basically going to do a v going down to the butt and it's almost kind of like an almond shape that I do for this one and I'm just gonna follow that pattern just making straight slashes all across the back and as I go I'm just stretching this fabric out and double checking that it's even on either side now I'm going to do the same little uh feeding under and pulling through method but I'm only going to start it halfway uh right at the small of the waist and I'm going to pin it on the butt and now I'm going to do a different braiding technique where I pull it I twist it over and then I Loop the next piece through it and repeat and then pin it up at the top I like doing this technique for the back of it because it kind of gives it equal pulling tension on both the top and the bottom of the Garment so it doesn't feel like it's pulling up your butt as much now I'm just sewing all those little pieces I pinned in place I use a zigzag stitch for this [Music] and there you go you're done there's your finished bodysuit I hope you love how your project turned out and if you want to show it off I have a Facebook sewing group where you can promote your sewing business you can ask for advice or you could just show off your project that's also in the description below and make sure to like comment and subscribe if you want to support the channel thanks so much for crafting with me foreign