How to make custom shirts (2023)

When it comes to merch trends, custom shirts will always be on the list. They are fun, useful, and expressive pieces perfect for gifting, promoting, and a great addition to your merch store.

Creating your own custom shirt should not be stressful. Here’s how:

Prepare your design file

Ai or PNG works best for us to make sure we have the high-quality version of your artwork when creating your mockup. We also accept PDF, PNG, and JPEG files.

What if I can’t design my own artwork?

We’re here to help! Here’s how:

Get a pen and paper and sketch your idea for us. It doesn’t have to be perfectly drawn, the purpose of the sketch is for us to get a good understanding of how you want your design to turn out instead of blindly guessing what you want, and would save us time going back and forth with revisions.

Here’s a sample sketch from one of our clients that we turned into a digital artwork

If you want to know more about our free design conversion service, you may read this blog.

Research your preferred printing method

Silk screen printing

Silk screen printing is the most popular printing method for custom shirts. It is a manual process of printing your design. The silkscreen is placed over the shirt and the ink is dragged across the canvas to transfer the color and create the design.

Silk screen printing works best for designs with 1-2 colors and uses a thicker ink that has a softer feel when touched. This printing method is also an affordable option when ordering large quantities.

Heat Transfer

As the name implies, this printing method uses a heat press machine to transfer your design to the shirt. The artwork is typically printed onto a special transfer paper and then pressed onto the shirt.

Decide on your shirt material

A helpful factor to consider when deciding on the material is the use of your custom shirt. It just makes sense to consider that your classic, casual tee has a different fabric from your sports uniform.

Here are your options:

Combed cotton

Combed cotton is a kind of cotton that has been given a specific treatment before being spun into yarn, which results in it having a much softer feel than regular cotton. The texture of combed cotton is softer because it lacks short threads to stick out and prickle and all dirt and impurities have been removed from the thread. When it comes to quality and durability combed cotton is strong because shorter and breakable fibers have been removed through combing.

Quick Dry

Quick-dry fabrics usually sit on top of the skin. Thanks to this contact, they are able to act as a sponge for sweat and moisture, pulling it towards the garment’s outer layer and away from the skin. In addition, when the contact surfaces between moisture and air increase, sweat-wicking fabrics can speed up the natural process of evaporation.

Quick-dry fabrics can be made of various materials, including natural and manmade fibers, among which the most common are merino wool, nylon, and polyester. While cotton is the fastest natural quick-dry fabric to dry, polyester is considered the overall fastest fiber. In less than two hours, polyester garments can be completely dry while also remaining antimicrobial and antibacterial.

Decide on the quantity

To upkeep sustainability regulations and minimize waste, each of our products has variable minimum order quantities that are dependent on fabric and design work. Your Stuff Made’s MOQ for a basic custom shirt order is 50 pieces to support small business owners and creators who are starting to test the waters. However, we recommend going for 100 because of the small price difference

Decide on your sizing breakdown

Our MOQ includes all sizes. When you’ve decided on the quantity, the next step is identifying how that number is broken down into the shirt’s sizes. Our team does not have restrictions when it comes to this so you have the freedom of how many pieces each size you want to create.

Here is our size chart for your reference