Shirt Apron Tutorial... Part One!

Are you ready for the "Shirt Apron Tutorial" that I promised you? Well... grab your shirt, a sharp pair of scissors and some pins! Today I will be teaching you the blue shirt apron on the left... the one with the collar.

 I must warn you though... This is the first or second tutorial that I have ever done in my life... so please bare with me and be forgiving of my mistakes! :)

You will also need is a simple "Butcher's Apron" pattern similar to the one above.  As you can see by the sticker, this one cost me only 50 cents at the thrift store.

Remember... The larger the shirt, the more room you will have in your finished apron. The one I will be working with today is a men's X-large with a 34-35" length sleeve, which will allow me to make longer ties.

I am working with a shirt that has flat felled seams which makes for less work. First off... open your shirt and cut on the back side of the side seam as close as you can without cutting into the front piece of the felled seam.

By following close you will have a perfect finished side seam with no need for turning. For those of you using a shirt with regular seams, you will simply cut down the middle of the side seams. You then will need to turn under 1/4" twice to form a narrow side seam.

Otherwise the side seams of you apron will look all finished like this. Talk about easy peasy! 

Continue cutting the same way until you have gone up over the shoulder and back down, cutting your sleeves completely away from the shirt.

You will then open up your shirt and lay it flat. Pin the apron pattern piece on the shirt placing the armhole edge even with the armhole of the shirt at one point as shown (white pin). Most likely it will extend beyond the side seam. That is okay! 

Now this is crucial... Pin the top piece of the pattern so it extends above the top shoulder seam by one inch, and 1/2" this side of the neck seam, just under the collar. The placement of your pattern should look similar to the picture above.

Here is a close up of how it should look at the top edge by the collar. Now cut along the pattern stopping just above the red pin at the point of the pattern piece. Do not cut toward the collar in the direction the pin is going.

Once cut... your shirt should look something like this along the side...

and similar to this at the neck.

Next... continue to cut around the neck leaving a 1/2" seam allowance, stopping one inch before the shoulder seam on the other side so you can tapper it like this. 

You may need to cut a little more off the side to remove the felled seam from the sleeve area. Be sure and tapper it toward the top, being careful not to cut too close to the pocket. My shirt had a larger than normal upper pocket for some reason.

To cut the other side the same as the first, you will simply fold the shirt in half matching side seams and pin...

carefully matching the shoulder seams and collar edge at the neck (red pin). The shirt now becomes your pattern guide for cutting the other side. 

Now we are ready to sew!

First... finish the curved armhole area by simply running a small zig zag stitched along the edge. Turn under 1/4 inch and top-stitch.

You will do this starting from one side to the other, turning under the seam allowance at the collar as you go. Along the collar area, I stitched right on the same stitch line that was already there.

 Now the fun part... The pocket! 

Take the sleeve and lay it down as if you were going to iron it. I wanted to have a deep pocket so I placed the pocket pattern piece so it extended 1" above the cuff seam line, lining the first placement line up with the cuff seam across the top. In order to get the pocket so it would be straight on the apron and not higher on one side than the other... I lined the straight of the grain arrow up with the button and placket underneath. Then I cut straight across. It worked great!

I then marked the center top of the cuff on the back with a pin...

also doing the same to the bottom.

This gave me my cutting line for my pocket as you can see at the top of the picture above. Now cut it from pin to pin. This opens the sleeve up and makes the side seam allowance for the pocket. 

If you desire to add trim to the pocket, do so now by placing your trim along the cuff edge.

 Next... mark the seam allowance on the pocket by sewing a 5/8" basting stitch around all raw edges. Then run two rows of gathering stitches on each side of the basting thread on the lower edge so you can pull the bottom in to make the pocket square. 

Press the edges under along the 5/8" basting line and top-stitch the pocket along the edge with a narrow seam. Form a triangle at the top to give it more strength.

The bottom of the pocket will be gathered and look something like this!

I loved the idea of having a deep, full pocket with lots of room. You never know what might end up in the pocket of an apron!

You will need to undo the first inch or so, on each side of the upper pocket so you can apply the trim.

For the ties... You will need to remove the cuff on the remaining sleeve and cut it right down the middle with you large ruler. 

Place wrong sides of the sleeve together and pin the tie pattern piece on. If the sleeve is a little short... no worry... the ties will be plenty long. This is where that 34-35" length comes in handy.

To form the ties, make a narrow hem on each long edge. Fold right sides together and stitch across one end.

Turn that open to form your point.

Make a little tuck on the opposite end of the tie. Turn under 1/4" and... 

Stitch in place on the back side of the apron where the top meets the side. You can see I used the same top-stitching lines that were already there from the felled seams.

Lastly... Top-stitch the trim onto the bottom of your apron, tapering it up on the sides...

and folding it under at the front.

Here is the finished product modeled by my dear... sweet friend Judi! Trust me... she makes anything look good!!!

Let me just tell you...

Judi was so excited by my apron that she went straight down to the thrift store and purchased a couple of men's shirts...

And here is what she made! How cute is that?!

Not only do I love the shirt she found... but I adore the trim that she used!

You can only guess what we will be wearing at our next retreat... That is if we don't wear them out before!

Please let me know if you make a shirt apron. I would love to see it and know if this tutorial helped in any way. I know there is a chance that you might not even understand it. If that is the case or you have any questions... just e-mail me!