Project Ethos Fashion: DIY Time

by Sarah Clifford

With July 4th quickly approaching, I couldn’t help but feeling patriotic.  I needed some new American swag for the holiday.  I turned my sights to some American flag shorts, but seeing as how the ones I wanted from Topshop were around $70, I improvised.

I took a quick trip to Goodwill and after hardly any digging, found a killer pair of mom jeans that fit like a glove: $3.  When I got home, I cut them into shorts.  Then tried them on and re-cut them again and again until they were just the right length.

I had some fabric paint from a previous project, but WalMart has some for super cheap that you can pick up.

After the shorts are cut, paint the right front side solid blue and the left front side solid red.  I think it looks cool to only paint to the side seam and avoid the pockets, but to each his own!

After the paint is completely dry, you can either draw stars on the blue side or use a stencil.  Fill them in with the white fabric paint.

Then on to the last step, the stripes.  I just used a ruler to space them out then filled alternating ones with the white fabric paint.

After your shorts are totally dry, the last step is just to wash and dry them so they fray a little.  And tada, you’re ready for some 4th of July action.

Project Ethos Fashion: DIY Time

By Sarah Clifford

Every now and again, I have this urge to create, whether it’s art, a piece of clothing, or an accessory. This past weekend I was out shopping and realized that friendship bracelets were everywhere. Free People was selling them for $18 a pop and just before I added one to my shopping bag, I realized, “Hey, I can make this myself!”

So after a quick trip to a local crafts store, I headed home to create a friendship bracelet of my own. I had a vague memory of making this when I was a kid, so I figured it’d come back to me. Not so much.


A little internet browsing and I was back in the game. Honestly…WTF: http://honestlywtf.com/diy/diy-friendship-bracelet has an awesome tutorial that I highly recommend. All you need is embroidery thread, tape and some scissors (and then a little patience).

They’re a little addicting, so be prepared to have a lot of thread on hand for all the color combos you come up with. After you have a few, you can mix up patterns, add rhinestone embellishments, and change colors.

Pile them on to add some flair to any outfit, be it your work attire or your get up for hitting the beach. Happy DIY-ing!