The Search for the Perfect T-Shirt | The Seamly Basic Tee

The Seamly Basic Tee was by far the most requested t-shirt when I posted about my series a couple weeks ago – everyone LOVES this t-shirt! I’ll be honest – when I made this shirt, I hated it. But after seeing the pictures of it and wearing it for a full day – I can see why you all like it so much! While it may not be my perfect t-shirt, there’s a lot of good to it.

The Seamly Basic Tee was a product of a collaboration with Seamly and Indiesew and is an exclusive pattern for Indiesew. It is a relaxed fit t-shirt with an optional breast pocket and short sleeves. It features only one neckline and one sleeve length – scoop neck and short sleeves.

As with most t-shirt patterns, the instructions were really clear and easy to follow. As it’s a collaboration with Indiesew, there are links to helpful blog posts on Indiesew throughout the instructions. I didn’t hem the sleeves or the hem because I thought I really hated the t-shirt.

So a couple things I did change or would change:

• The sleeves on this t-shirt are really long – like they hit close to my elbow and were very loose. For me, that makes me feel like I’m wearing a boy t-shirt and so I chopped the sleeves by about 2 inches each to give me a shorter sleeve look instead of elbow length sleeves. I think next time I would hem those to make them a little bit more tailored.
• It’s a very relaxed fit t-shirt – I made a medium and I think next time I would size down to see if that helps the fit. That being said, it was a great layering t-shirt under a cardigan.
• The shirt is very long – I love longer t-shirts, but this was super long. Maybe I could have solved that by hemming it, but I thought I would hate this t-shirt after I first made it, so I didn’t hem it. Next time, shorten and hem!
• I used a bamboo knit – Looking back on the pattern, it recommends a rayon jersey. Maybe that would make it drape a little bit more? Maybe I’ll try that for my next one!

This t-shirt is definitely more of a relaxed look than I was going for, but I actually think I liked it after seeing me in a picture (does that happen to anyone else? Pictures are sometimes a better judge than the mirror…)

As with my other t-shirt posts, here are the cliff notes:

Size Chosen: I sewed up the medium with has measurements of 35.5-36.5, 28-29, 37-38 and my measurements are 36, 29, 39.

The Variations Offered: It comes with only one variation – scoop neck with elbow length sleeves.

Ease of Construction: Easy! I used my sewing machine to sew all of the top and it came together really quickly.

The Fit: This is a relaxed fit t-shirt with long elbow length sleeves. While I ended up liking this, I don’t think this is the fit that I really love.

This is post 3 of a series of my search for the perfect t-shirt, if you’ve missed the other posts make sure to check out the intro post here and the first post in my series the Sunny Dress here.