TREND ALERT!

Denim shorts are THE summer trend this year. But not just any denim shorts - DIY embellished denim. Most of the time when people talk about current trends, that means you have to go to fancy boutiques, or at least department stores to find them.

True to form, once it caught on that this was trending, a lot of boutiques actually commissioned designers to snatch up “vintage denim” from secondhand stores (high-waisted, no-stretch cutoff’s are HUGE right now!), embellish them and then are selling them for $40-$60 each.

But you can TOTALLY make your own,
and be on-trend in no time for under $10.

 

Here’s how:

  1. With any of these DIY transformations, just start with a pair of secondhand jeans that fit you well in the waist and thighs.
  2. Put the jeans on and have help marking all the way around how much you want to take off.
  3. Remember to cut longer in the back to accommodate your backside.
    You shouldn’t be cutting the front and back perfectly even with each other.
  4. You can either fully cut them (for beginners) or you can cut just a bit on the marks you made and then carefully (forcefully) rip the denim. Depending on the consistency of the fabric, this can be difficult, and may require some assistance from the scissors. Also know that this is the point that many DIY-ers accidentally rip the shorts WAY shorter than intended.
  5. Once they’ve been taken from jeans to shorts, then you can start embellishing! And there’s really NO limits there.

Embellish Away:

One of our customers, Bridget decided to shop Thrift Town and
show us how she transformed her secondhand denim finds.

She simply found a pair of regular jeans that fit her well,
cut them off and added lace to the pockets.

This pair: she added lace to side cut-outs.
Each pair of shorts is completely unique and hand-made.

We found a great tutorial on creating bleach cutoffs here:

1. Supplies: shorts, bleach, bucket, white vinegar, shorts hanger, and water.

2. Begin by filling a bucket with two parts water one part bleach. Place shorts into the bucket as far down as you would like to begin the bleaching process. Depending on how dramatic you would like the effect to be, leave them in the bucket for 5-30 minutes.
You might have to re-dip them multiple times to get the right effect.

3. Next, to stop the bleaching process dip the shorts into a bucket of two parts water one part white vinegar. Be sure you use white vinegar and not regular vinegar (regular can create a very harmful chemical when mixed with bleach). Let them dry, and then hand wash them or wash them alone in the washing machine and dry them in the dryer.

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Isn’t this fun?? Get to Thrift Town and start DIY-ing your denim!

For more inspiration, we found a few more leads on distressing, designing and DIY-ing your denim:

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WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Do you DIY your jeans? Show us!
What do you think about our DIY denim?

. . . . .

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