Geekphoria: DIY: Tube Top Update

Hey everyone! I've finally made that addition to my Robin tube top, so I can finally add on to that DIY!

If you don't remember this DIY, you can either follow this link, or look at this picture:

I cut the t-shirt (from Threadless) across the top, just under the collar. I then cut off the sleeves, and made sure the side seam ran all the way up the shirt. I then folded over the top, hemmed it, and added in an elastic band. However, I wasn't completely happy with it. The print on the shirt was high, which meant that the I was forced to make the band small.

So here's where I updated the shirt: I added a thick black band to the top.

I began by cutting a strip off the bottom of a plain, black t-shirt. I like to use the plain t-shirts you can get at craft stores for my t-shirt alterations, since it's typically the same fabric blend. I cut off a strip about 3 inches thick.

I then wrapped the band around the top of the tube top, in order to match the size exactly. I pinned the strip where I wanted the center hem to be, and cut off some of the excess fabric.

I then sewed the ends together, once again taking time to trim off the excess.

With the strip now as a loop, I slid it around the top of the tube top. Since I was using the black t-shirts hem as the top hem (I suck at hemming sometimes, so I decided to make it easier on myself), I made sure it was facing the right direction (the "fronts" of each piece were touching each other). If you want to hem the top yourself, though, you don't have to be careful.

I pinned the fabric so that I could sew on the original hem, just underneath the elastic. The position of the band allows it to flip up and cover the original elastic, for extra support. Once the band was sewn on, it looked a little something like this:

Ta-da! This whole process took me less than twenty minutes, so I was able to do another t-shirt alteration! You guys can see it sometime next week.

Here's the final product, hanging on my door. The pictures of me wearing it somehow were deleted from my phone (My camera is lost. Again.), and since I'm miserably sick today, I didn't want to post a picture of me. The quality of the last picture is a little meh, but you can tell what's going on!

The band makes the tube top look a lot better. It balances off the top, and makes it look more polished. I'm glad I finally took time to change the tube top. Tell me what you think in the comments! Am I right in thinking that it looks better?