Make your own slogan t-shirt

Child wearing their slogan t-shirt

 

You will need:

  •  A t-shirt
  • Acrylic paint, fabric paint or permanent marker pens
  • Pencil
  • A cardboard box
  • Biro
  • Scissors or a craft knife
  • An iron (depending on which paint you use)

1. Start by thinking about what slogan you want to put on your t-shirt. You may want to do some research or look for inspiration online.


2. Next think about how you want your slogan to appear. How should the words be spaced and laid out? What font type will you use? Will you add any other details?

Slogan My Voice Matters sketched onto paper


3. Once you’ve made your plan you need to lay the slogan out on paper. You could opt to design it on a computer before printing it out or sketch onto the paper yourself.

Pencil scribbles on the back of the paper


4. Turn the paper over and scribble in pencil across the entire page making sure there’s good coverage.


5. Take a piece of cardboard that’s slightly larger than your slogan design and lay your paper on top. You don’t want the paper to move so may choose to tape it down.

Transferring slogan design to cardboard


6. Pressing hard with a biro go over your slogan design and you should find that the design transfers faintly onto the cardboard. It’s worth checking after you’ve done a few lines to make sure you can see the design on the cardboard. If you can’t, add more pencil to the back of the paper before trying again.

Cardboard template of slogan


7. Make the cardboard into a stencil by cutting out the letters. If you have access to a craft knife and can use one safely, that’s the easiest option but working slowly with scissors is fine too.

Cardboard inside t-shirt to protect the back


8. Take another piece of cardboard and place it inside your t-shirt where you’ll be painting the design. This is to stop any paint going through to the other side.

Cardboard stencil on the t-shirt


9. Position your stencil on the t-shirt where you’d like the slogan to appear.

Painting the slogan using a stencil


10. Paint or draw your slogan onto the t-shirt using your stencil as a guide. It’s important to keep both pieces of cardboard still throughout the entire painting process to avoid smudges. We also found it helpful to push the stencil down onto the t-shirt firmly when painting up to the edges of each letter.


11. When you’ve painted the entire design carefully lift the stencil off the t-shirt by peeling it away from top to bottom in a smooth movement.


12. Leave your design to dry completely.

Ironing the acrylic paint design to seal it


13. For your t-shirt to be washable you need to seal the paint once it’s dried (permanent markers won’t require this step, though the design will fade slightly over time). If you used fabric paint follow the instructions on the packet. If you used normal acrylic paint, iron the design on the reverse for 30 seconds. This should allow you to wash the t-shirt on a cool setting and preserve the design.