Loading ...So it’s coming up to Christmas. What are you going to buy your that whinging little 11 year old brat cousin to shut him up. Don’t fall trap to something that will haunt you until the batteries run out 3 weeks later (like that incessantly annoying Tickle Me Elmo you bought him a couple of years back - heck, even Nanna was ready to ring his neck!)
Ever thought about creating a custom tshirt as a gift?
Over the past few years I’ve created quite a few one-off tshirts as gifts for close friends and family. Custom tshirts are always well received, because they are gifts with personality, thought, and sometimes maybe even the labour of love.
Depending on your budget and the amount of effort you’re willing to put in, there’s plenty of methods of producing your tees.
Have you ever tried screen printing at home - it’s heaps of fun! Just hit up your local art shop for a basic screen-printing kit, grab a few blank tees from your local store and bob’s your uncle.
Um, perhaps you will look as cool as this guy with your custom Chrissy tee…
Iron-on ‘patch hacking’ (where you find old school retro iron-on patches and ‘remix’ them into new designs) is another method of creating custom tees with less mess.
For the graphic designers amongst us, who are proficient with the use of graphics applications such as those contained within the Adobe Creative Suite (incidentally, if you haven’t upgraded to Adobe CS4 yet you should think about it, Adobe is offering a limited offer at the moment where you can Save up to $200 on eligible upgrades to CS4), print on demand tshirt sites are a hassle free way of producing your custom tees.
My favorite online store for print-on-demand is Spreadshirt as they offer American Apparel blank tshirts, good print quality, reasonable prices, and have set up local bases in a variety of countries to minimize delivery expenses and production time. Cafepress is another option - I view them as the cheaper alternative, slightly lower on quality but it comes down to the old adage that ‘you get what you pay for’.
If any readers have printed, or intend on printing tshirts as Christmas presents I’d love to hear from you - just post a comment using the Comments link below this article.
So if you’re stuck for Christmas ideas on a budget, then maybe a custom tshirt for a loved (or not so loved one) is the answer.
**UPDATE** Spreadshirt currently has free delivery for the next 6 days (you have until the end of this week to place your order). If you’re as interested in shopping malls as I am, then sitting in your comfy chair designing your Chrissy gifts online is sounding even more promising!
