Layered Long Sleeve Kensington Tee

My middle daughter saw this fabric and immediately claimed it as her own, so I decided to make her a hacked Kensington Tee.

Sewing for this girl is so gratifying. She loves everything I make for her, insists on wearing it to school the next day, and poses for pictures fairly cooperatively. Plus she’s stinkin cute and her profile is my favorite thing in the known universe.

I had to bring her down off the “hand on hip” ledge though. She really loves this pose. I guess a girl always likes to know what to do with her hands in pictures.

I’m pretty sure the heart fabric is from Joanns. I’ve had it for years. It’s a great stable knit, closer to interlock than jersey. It helped make this such a quick and easy sew. I only made a couple hacks, so let’s go over those really quick.

First, I added a long sleeve under the short sleeve for a layered look. The pattern comes with both lengths, but I did a faux long sleeve to reduce bulk in the sleeve cap. I really like this method of adding layered sleeves because it still looks like the short sleeve is hemmed and the long sleeve is coming from underneath. Not so, friends, not so.

1. Cut a short sleeve. Then lay the long sleeve pattern on your contrast fabric. Lay the short sleeve on top of that, aligning the top of the sleeve. Cut the long sleeve, starting at the hem, and going up to where the short sleeve ends and then a half inch above that, to include the seam allowance. Then cut across to the fold of the fabric. The red line indicates where you’ll cut the long sleeve2. Press your hem allowance on the short sleeve to the wrong side.

3. Lay the long sleeve down on the short sleeve, so the upper part of the long sleeve covers the pressed hem allowances on the short sleeve and pin in place. Both pieces should be laying right side down.

4. Flip the sleeve over, and on the right side, either use a coverstitch, twin needle, or two lines of stitching to hem the short sleeve, catching the long sleeve on the underside.

Now you can continue sewing the sleeve together as indicated in the directions.

For the curved hem, I simply cut the front and back bodices where indicated by the red line, so form a slight curved hem. Just make sure the side seams remain the same length.

My final alteration was to sew a traditional knit t-shirt binding, instead of the type outlined in the pattern. To do that, I cut a strip of fabric that was 2″ x 80% of the neckline measurement (for a size 6, that was 12.8″). Then sew together the two short ends of the binding. Fold the binding in half lengthwise, so both right sides are facing out. Divide the binding into quarters, marking with pins. Divide the neckline into quarters, marking with pins. Align the pins in the binding with the pins in the neckline and pin them together (pin the seam in the binding to the center back of the shirt). Then sew them right sides together with a stretch stitch, stretching the binding to fit the neckline between pins. For more detailed pictures on this technique, check out Google, it seems pretty knowledgeable about the subject! This is also the method used on my scoop neck Union St. Tee.

That’s it! Such an easy and fun hack!