History (Short) of the T-shirt, Today's Popular T-Shirts, T-shirts for Women, Kids, Men & Babies

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T-Shirts as Communication, Comfort-wear and Style

History of the T Shirt

T shirts evolved from one piece under garments (union suits) that were cut in two with the top long enough to tuck into the waistband.

During or following the Spanish-American war, t shirts without buttons were issued by the U.S. Navy and the word t shirt was adopted into the dictionary during the 1920s.

However, that all said after further research I've discovered the t shirt may have originated overseas in Europe. It appears the bottom line is: It's not quite clear where the t shirt originated.

T-Shirts Today

From a T-shirt one wears, you can tell their diet preference: vegetarian or meat eater; their political thoughts, ideals, or which way they swing. We can voice our opinion about a specific political issue like this one I've created regarding Senior Citizens. You can deduct who supports the Green movement, their sexual preference, if a fella is a leg man, boob or butt man. Baby shirts announce their fist Christmas or Easter while others announce they're the older sibling.

When I was a competitive sailor, we received t shirts as prizes making it pretty darn easy to tell who placed and who didn't. T shirts are advertising billboards, pajamas for women who pilfer their guy's t shirt drawer and we dress our pets in apparel made specifically for the breed of animal. T shirts - it seems - are man's preferred apparel (even worn with slacks and jacket), and according to a couple of fashion web sites I found, the t shirt will remain popular in 2012 among men and women most especially as savvy artists grasp on to pattern, color and image trends.

Below, I've posted a collection naturally based on my own taste.

Sources Wikipedia, Tshirt Buyers Guide

NOTE: Gimp (photo editing/illustration software) tutorial at the bottom of the page. I LOVE this program!

How to Paint a T-shirt with Acrylic Paints

Short how-to

Paint Create Repurpose
Short how-to paint shirts or other material with acrylic paints

Artist T-shirts

Or... T-shirt Gifts for Artists

Artist's Acrylic Paint Tubes Picture Shirts
Artist's Acrylic Paint Tubes Picture Pull Over Sweatshirt
Artist Brushes T Shirts
Artist Brushes T-shirt

Christmas Shirts for Kids and Adults

Personalize your favorite tee

Naturally, the collection of novelty tees wouldn't be complete without shirts for the holidays like Christmas. Not everybody loves Christmas but for those who do - men, women and children - there's a wide variety to choose from... Rudolf and Santa certainly not excluded.

The poinsettia is a painting I created with acrylic. All the other pictures - excluding the layout, background designs) are by Trina Clark at DigiScrapKits.com.

Reindeer Dear Santa Shirt

Reindeer Dear Santa Shirt

Santa Flies Shirt

Santa Flies Shirt

Painted Poinsettia Christmas Flower Pull Over Sweatshirt

Painted Poinsettia Christmas Flower Pull Over Sweatshirt

Christmas Candles, Candy Cane & Stocking T Shirt

Christmas Candles, Candy Cane & Stocking T Shirt

Kitty Cat Picture Christmas T-shirts

Kitty Cat Picture Christmas T-shirts

Goofy Penguins Hoody

Goofy Penguins Hoody

Love Coffee?

Say It with a Tee

I Heart Coffee Grunge T-Shirt

I Heart Coffee Grunge T-Shirt


"I heart.(blank)"... You see it everywhere and with today's technology and graphics it's VERY easy to make. As I mentioned somewhere in this lens, there are plenty of brushes to create coffee stains on the Internet for free. Just do the search.

StickyNote

Visit my lens about Mugs, Cups and Thermals. Loads of cool art and lots of links to get lost in.

Ohhhhhhh.... go on! It won't hurt you to copy and paste the link, ya silly goose. http://www.squidoo.com/popular-mugs-cups-thermal-mugs-for-coffee-and-tea-drinkers

Grunge with a Message

Spoonerism Tees

Spoonerism Tee Shirt shirt
Spoonerism Tee Shirt by Visages
Create customized tee shirts using zazzle
I desperately needed to round out my t shirts to include something for the younger set. Research, research, research: That's what I did. My 30 year old son turned me on to web sites he shops (not mine, of course) where I could browse to get a grip on what kids are wearing. That solved, I had to find a way to create grunge text and paint splatters.

Know what? You can find free paint brushes for splatter, grunge, trees, flowers, flourishes, etc. for FREE! Yup, no strings attached on many of them and I can use them with Gimp. Just type "free grunge paint brushes for Gimp.

Next, I needed a subject for my shirts. I love words so I looked around and found spoonerisms wherein one takes the first letter of two words and switches them so that pig rot is now rig pot. So began my new line: Spoonerism Tees.

Spoonerism Tees

Spoonerism Tee Shirt Winning Sailor
Spoonerism Quotes Tshirt
Spoonerism Tee Shirt

T Shirts with Ferret Images

Ferret T Shirts for Humans

I love ferrets. I have two who are funny and whimsical.

Although the ferret owner niche is quite narrow, there is a market for ferret related gifts for humans. My more popular ferret related items is ferret quotes, or ferret-isms as I like to call them.

Ferret Cute Picture

Ferret Cute Picture

FrankenFerret Shirt

FrankenFerret Shirt

Cute Ferret Pictures Sayings and Quotes T-shirt

Cute Ferret Pictures Sayings and Quotes T-shirt

Ferrets with a Smile Shirt

Ferrets with a Smile Shirt

Funny Ferret Gifts T-shirts

Funny Ferret Gifts T-shirts

Ferret Picture T-shirts

Ferret Picture T-shirts

Ferret Gifts for Humans Tee Shirts

Ferret Gifts for Humans Tee Shirts
Ferret Cute Picture T Shirts
Wuzzy Foozle Spoonerism & Ferret Picture Shirts

Illlustrated Graphic Animal Shirts

Mammals, Birds

I love animals and I especially love to draw them. The panda bear was a commissioned piece. A lady in France wanted a panda bear apron. I grabbed pencils, paper and my stuffed panda and set to work. She adored him. Shortly after I uploaded and added him to product, I received a notice that two Panda Bear Aprons were sold.

The little yellow chicks... Don't they look like leader dots with eyes? If you like drawing images targeted toward kids, grab your remote and start watching cartoons. Lots of inspiration there.

Also using art your kids have drawn on t shirts (or even mugs, magnets and posters) is a way to create a uniquely personalized gift.

The bear and kitty cat art by Trina Clark are purchased clip art from DigiScrapKits.com.

Who da Man? 3 Retro Colored Owls Shirt

Colorful Owls on a Vine Picture T-shirt

Colorful Owls on a Vine Picture T-shirt

Unique Panda Bear T Shirts

Unique Panda Bear T Shirts

Yellow Green Baby Bird Tee Shirts

Yellow Green Baby Bird Tee Shirts

Kitty on Plaid with Balls of Yarn Border T Shirt

Kitty on Plaid with Balls of Yarn Border T Shirt

Owl Art Merchandise Tee Shirt

Owl Art Merchandise Tee Shirt
Silly Cute Cartoon Birds T Shirt
Cute Who's da Boss TShirt
Panda Bear Chef Picture T-shirt
Fuzzy Monster Cartoon Character Tee Shirts
Cute Horned Owl Painting Pullover Sweatshirt

Family Reunion Tees

According to Zazzle...

... family reunion shirts are popular. Here are a few of my own using old family pictures.

If you're looking for a unique idea for a shirt, look through your parents' and grandparents' pictures (photographs), scan it or get someone to scan it for you then add it to t shirts along with your own message.

Vintage Family Picnic Tshirt

Vintage Family Picnic Tshirt

Vintage Antique Picture of Family T-shirt

Vintage Antique Picture of Family T-shirt

Vintage Family Picnic Tshirts

Vintage Family Picnic Tshirts

Funny T Shirts

NEW FROM VISAGES: Short Joke Tees

My husband and kids are quite tall. Daughter is 5' 9" while son is 6' 4" unless he's wearing his boots that make him 6' 6" so I lived with short jokes for quite awhile. I'm 5' 6".

Funny Tee How's the Air Up There?

Funny Tee How's the Air Up There?

Funny Tee Belly Button Smell

Funny Tee Belly Button Smell

I'm Tall You're Short Funny Shirt

I'm Tall You're Short Funny Shirt

My Own Political Statement

Voicing My Opinions Via T Shirts

I live in a college town with a population of 80 thousand. Despite years and years of experience as manager, art director, layout artist and graphic artist, I have not managed to find a job. You will never get a company to admit to it and you would be hard pressed to prove it but I feel, intuit discrimination toward my age (mid-50s) and even toward my years of experience. The would-be employer prefers hiring less experienced youngsters spending months in training and less in wages. And so, I developed this line of shirts during a moment of frustration.

Keep Jobs in America Senior Citizen Shirt

Keep Jobs in America Senior Citizen Shirt

Just Ask a Senior 55 or Over T Shirt

Just Ask a Senior 55 or Over T Shirt

Baby Boomer = Gray Wall T Shirts

Baby Boomer = Gray Wall T Shirts

Hire a Senior Tee Shirts

Hire a Senior Tee Shirts

Over 55 Gray Wall Shirts

Over 55 Gray Wall Shirts

Seniors Can Work Too Tee Shirt

Seniors Can Work Too Tee Shirt

Visages at Zazzle

Personalize or customize gifts from Visages for just about any occasion... Photos, paintings, drawings you can personalize
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Visages Blog

New creatiions, how to videos and more!
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Visages at Zazzle

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How to Make Your Own Unique T Shirt

Make Your Own Unique Gifts, Invitations, Announcements

Want to learn how to make your own unique personalized t shirt or other items like mugs or hate, check out this video.

If you're daunted by the task, not sure how, a little jumpy about diving into something new, the head to Visages (zazzle.com/visages) and contact me. I will help you at no charge. We'll get your image uploaded and onto gift items for you to purchase before you can say "thisistoohardIcan'tdoit".
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New Guestbook Comments

  • naturesfun Jan 17, 2012 @ 2:38 pm | delete
    Great lens
  • baby-strollers Dec 19, 2011 @ 4:08 pm | delete
    I don't know if my parents would appreciate this or not?
  • PoncsMom Dec 19, 2011 @ 6:26 pm | delete
    Why? Are you referring to the 55 and over, grey wall t-shirts?
  • WaynesWorld Nov 13, 2011 @ 5:16 pm | delete
    "87 % of all internet facts are made up on the spot." Abraham Lincoln
  • PoncsMom Dec 19, 2011 @ 6:25 pm | delete
    Old Abe seems to have transcended time!
  • madinvestment Nov 7, 2011 @ 4:18 pm | delete
    Thanks for sharing this with us fellow squiders! One big thumbs up vote left for this lens!
  • Close2Art Nov 4, 2011 @ 8:20 pm | delete
    very cool page, nice selections...blessed:)rob
  • cffutah Nov 3, 2011 @ 7:29 pm | delete
    some cool stuff on her, gave ya a 'thumbs up'.
  • saxie5 Nov 1, 2011 @ 12:07 pm | delete
    Interesting and I learned something new!
  • DebinSC Oct 31, 2011 @ 12:27 pm | delete
    Well done!
  • StreetJustice Oct 31, 2011 @ 11:21 am | delete
    Excellent Lens! Thank You!
  • elfinart Oct 31, 2011 @ 9:24 am | delete
    Great collection! I especially like your age discrimination shirts and have added my Aging with Flair section above.
  • blueangel85 Oct 31, 2011 @ 5:32 am | delete
    really nice t-shirts !
  • prosepine Oct 31, 2011 @ 1:39 am | delete
    Interesting selection!
  • TMKtshirts Oct 31, 2011 @ 12:52 am | delete
    Nice lens! People are getting younger nowadays. Age discrimination is sad, but the mid 50's is still the prime of life.
  • PoncsMom Oct 31, 2011 @ 8:03 am | delete
    I agree and I will admit that probably the inability to find a job in my field is also partly due to this stinkin' economy and added burdens to businesses... That said, I'm glad I have the chance to utilize Zazzle and enjoy sales of my art
  • DigitalDreambuilder Oct 31, 2011 @ 12:24 am | delete
    A good selection of shirts
  • bebops Oct 30, 2011 @ 6:35 pm | delete
    Lots of great shirts to choose from!
  • animotaxis Oct 30, 2011 @ 5:40 pm | delete
    Nice variety and funny T-Shirts, great lens.

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