What Does a Teenage T-Shirt Designer do?

As a t-shirt designer, you’ll make graphic designs to put on t-shirts. Your design will be printed onto the t-shirts and the company will then sell the t-shirts. You can do this by simply using photoshop if you are creative. Keep in mind that these have to be very carefully done, as these will have to be purchased by people at some point based 100% off of your design. It’s helpful to have an artistic background if you become a t-shirt designer because you’ll need to make beautiful designs that people like and are willing to purchase.

How Much Does a Teenage T-Shirt Designer Get Paid?

As a t-shirt designer just getting started, you can expect to earn somewhere between $10-$15 per hour working for someone else. If you work for yourself and try to sell the t-shirts online, it can be more money per hour but this is a bigger challenge as you’ll handle the design and the marketing. The biggest issue with this type of work is that you need to be a very good artist. People won’t buy the t-shirt if the design doesn’t appeal to them.

How Can I Get Started as a Teenage T-Shirt Designer?

1. Before you begin, you’ll need to take a couple of lessons on graphic design. You may be a great artist with sketches, but you still need to transition to graphic design and understand photoshop if you want to make t-shirts. To do this, you should take some time to learn about the software. This can be done as an elective at your high school, a course at your college, or on Lynda.com. A good choice will be to take this course on photoshop, search “Photoshop CC One-on-One: Fundamentals by Deke McClelland”. In addition, you can also take this course on Udemy, search “Selling T-Shirts with TeeSpring by John Piteo” that explains the basics about becoming a t-shirt seller on TeeSpring. TeeSpring is great because all you do is submit a design and then they handle printing, shipping, and customer service.
2. Now that you’ve learned about graphic design and how to use Teespring, you should get the essential applications for designing t-shirts. A go-to application would be Photoshop and that’s what we recommend. You should do a couple of designs to get used to doing it, and to brush up your skills. At this stage, it’s okay to look at other t-shirt designs as inspiration. A good rule of thumb is to say that all t-shirts you make should be something that you would be willing to buy. After all, if you don’t want to buy your own t-shirt, who is?
3. Once you’ve gotten the right software, you’ll need to find a job as a t-shirt designer. You could go about this is many ways. There are multiple ways to do this. We personally recommend that you join TeeSpring and post your designs there as well as sharing them on your own social media profiles.
4. Congrats, you’re officially a teenage t-shirt designer. It’s a great way to earn a bit of cash while doing something you love. It will be a rewarding feeling when one day you see someone wearing a t-shirt that you designed. It will take a good amount of time to master t-shirt graphic design, but if you do so, you’ll make significant income in the future.

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Helpful Resources

• Lynda.com: This platform will teach you the skills you need to become a teen article writer.Course: ​Search for the course “Photoshop CC One-on-One: Fundamentals by Deke McClelland” and choose the most recent course.Udemy Course:​Search for the course “Selling T-Shirts with TeeSpring by John Piteo”
• Adobe Photoshop:  This is the software you need to us to design t-shirts.
• TeeSpring.com:  This is the website you can join to submit designs and they will handle the printing, shipping, and customer service.