Monday Motivation {up cycled sewing} | Go-Go Kim

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Monday, December 12, 2016

Monday Motivation {up cycled sewing}

Welcome back to Monday Motivation!

I am a huge supporter of making quilts and other items from reusing textiles. I call them the thrifted, gifted and found fabrics.  All of these fabrics are low or no cost.  They are generally easily obtained by going through your own closets, asking family or friends and also visiting your local thrift shops or yard sales.

The colors and textures are unlike quilters cotton and when sewn together are really something special!

Monday Motivation is upcycled sewing projects!

If you have never sewn with garments, look for 100% cotton shirts.  I have successfully used cotton blends and other fabrics but there can be more prep time and effort involved.  For beginners, I highly recommend 100% cotton only.

This is an up cycled quilt I made using only red thrifted garments and black for the center blocks. The blocks are a simple log cabin. You can read more about this quilt by visiting here.




Another quilt I made using thrift shop shirts is on my son's bed.  It is also log cabins ( my favorite) and turned out better than I had hoped for!  You can read more about this quilt here.



There is a certain knack when deconstructing clothing for getting the most from each item.  There are several tutorials on how to take garments apart making the most productive use of your time and yielding the most fabric.

Here are my two favorites for shirts!

Luke Haynes created a tutorial for Bernina We All Sew on how to deconstruct garments for easier storage and use. The tutorial can be found HERE.





The fabulous Bonnie Hunter has a video on "De-Boning" a shirt.




For jeans, the Deconstructing Jeans With the Least Amount of Waste is very good and can be found HERE.



When sewing with garments, for piecing and quilting the shirts, I use Aurifil 50wt.  For any denim projects, I use Aurifil 40wt or 28wt.  The denim is thicker and requires a more hefty weight of thread and also a denim needle. Skipped stitches and broken thread are never fun!


After you have prepped all of your fabulous new fabrics, you will need some projects to try them out!

Great looking denim lunch bag tutorial by Between the Lines.



Sew We Quilt has a lovely quilt using a fun fabric that she found in shorts!  See more of her tutorial HERE



This cushion cover collection by Ashbee Design is adorable!  You can find the Ampersand Tutorial HERE!


This is my all time favorite upcycled garment quilt tutorial! Seven shirts, One Quilt tutorial by Life is a Stitch! You can find this really fantastic tutorial by visiting HERE


Upcycled quilts can be very exciting! Mamaka Mills shares how she makes this cool block using striped shirts here.  


It's Always Autumn has a fantastic tutorial for this beautiful Modern Denim Quilt here.




And if you thought that all up cycled denim projects are just blue, you need to check out Andrea's Notebook for this FANTASTIC colorful quilt tutorial



This denim whale is possibly the cutest thing I have seen all year!  You can find this tutorial by visiting Valaan Villlapaitia 




I hope you find inspiration in these tutorials and make some creative time for yourself! 


Please join me for more fabulous tutorials, inspirations and humor that I share everyday on:





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5 comments

Teje Karjalainen said...

Hi Kim! Great post and your red quilt looks amazing! I love to use also shirts and if possible other fabrics I found from home. Two favourite quilts are made with hb:s shirts and those were in fact the main reason that I started to make quilts and patchwork. Thank you for many links! That denim bag is also on my pinterest board and I love the simple design. x Teje

Judy H said...

I have on my 'to-do' list for next year a 'dress shirt' quilt for my son-in-law, probably in blues and whites. Maybe a chevron pattern. Deconstructing is harder than constructing!

margaret said...

lots of good tips here, shirt quilts are all the rage here in the UK charity shops have been very busy

O'Quilts said...

wonderful post

Kathy@KayakQuilting said...

Thanks much for all the info and inspiration! Love your son's log cabin quilt!

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