Movie Tees For The Movie Buff

Arcane Projects offer a wide range of movie t-shirts, we’ve reviewed quite a few similar stores now however I have to admit that there are two things that stand out about this label over the competition. Firstly their choice in film is a little bit more esoteric, not obscure as such, but you will really need to know your celluloid with some of their t-shirts. Secondly they offer a unique sideline, something I haven’t seen at their competitors and that is a custom movie t-shirt service. In essence you name your favourite flick and they design a t-shirt that will allude to a detail of the plot, sometimes one that only those who can really call themselves ‘fans’ might recognise.

You will of course find all your old favourites a Arcane, including Terminator (1 & 2), The Shining, Fight Club and Aliens, but there are a few titles on offer that may come as a surprise. The eighties sci-fi classic The Running Man, an adaptation of a Stephen King short story written in 1982 under the pseudonym Richard Bachman, and Point Break, an early role for Keanu Reeves way before he found his place in movie history as Neo in The Matrix. However as I’ve already mentioned there’s nothing stopping you ordering your own custom movie tee, there are so many films out there that deserve this unique treatment, it would be great to see even more obscure movies get the ‘tee treatment’. As it happens I have THX1138 on the screen right now, the first and probably least well known George Lucas movie ever made, now that’s what I mean by obscure! Here are a few of my favourite t-shirts that have had the Arcane Project’s highly original going over, grab some popcorn, a giant cup of watery Coke, and kick back as we go to the movies… Read the story »

De-clutter With Simplified Clothing

As the site says, Simplified Clothing Midwest Love, and it couldn’t really be any clearer. This Metro Detroit suburban rebel label aims to give conformity a kick up the ass whilst simultaneously shelling out a hug or two to the dudes and dudettes who couldn’t give a damn. Life can be bland no matter where you are but suburbia can be most stifling of all, with neither the bright lights of the big cities or the freedom to roam of the wide open countryside, suburbanites learn to amuse themselves in a unique blend of wannabe metropolitan style tinged with a little yearning for a sleepy Sunday laying out in the backyard. Sunny days with planes making tracks in the skies, the radio blaring, itching to get going but enjoying the peace. Where the hell shall we go this weekend? God, don’t say the mall again? How about taking the train up town and catch a movie, or a club maybe? No, the night buses are full of puke and weirdos and everyone who’s got a car wants to drink. I’ve been there, suburbia, a strange kinship, restrained by regret and times wasted wanting. But things are changing, suburbia’s sources for fashion once appropriated from other more glamorous locations, finally gets its own back, putting its own homespun cynical philosophy on the garish and gaudy stylings of wannabe celebs and loft apartment dictators who have nothing better to say than ‘Look at me, I’m fabulous!’.

Simplified Clothing is a Mid West collective gunning for a placement in their own home turf and beyond, mixing up highly graphic inspirational art with plenty of nods to sneaker and skater culture, yet always staying true to their roots of suburban America. De-clutter that mind, turn your back on the busy streets and follow the rainbow that leads to where the grass is greener and sliced up like pieces of apple pie. It’s a neighbourhood barbecue for the soul, it’s a street party of the mind, it’s Simplified Clothing.
Read the story »

Soaring Through The Ivory Skies

Ivory Skies is a rather elegant t-shirt label offering a unique twist by combining ancient designs, emblems, talismans as it were, with ultra modern designer cuts. It’s a new angle in the market as far as I am concerned and this British (London) based company have put a great deal of research in to what they do, be it source materials or their choices of tees for printing.

The site looks posh to say the least, their products are a cut above the average, aimed at the discerning t-shirt lover looking for something a little more classy than you might be used to and they’ve kicked off the proceedings with their first collection ‘Ebony and Ivory’ - which is nothing like the track by McCartney and Jacko - I promised myself I wouldn’t mention that but what can you do - this brain is just too impulsive for its own good.

The store is smart and simply presented, everything before you laid out in black and white like a shiny Steinway, and what sticks with you above all else are the rather exotic and in some cases completely forgotten images of the ancient past on offer. I have to admit I had to do a little research myself when it came to the titles, if Chris was around I am sure she’d have given me a few pointers, being a hippie in a former incarnation and up for anything mythological, and no we’re not talking unicorns and faeries here, this is the real deal, or rather it was for historical eras such as Ancient Greece and Egypt.

I did think the actual store was something of a let down - presentation wise that is - they should fix up their template if they want to build a reputation as a label for the ’smart set’. The theme rapidly degrades to a bog-standard white/orange affair and each product description has a page title as thus “<ekm:pagetitle>”. But I’m in a forgiving mood so we’ll put that down to ‘teething troubles’ for this new label. What I can’t let pass by is the lack of background information for each t-shirt design, we’re not all historians, well actually probably none of us, and so to keep my and everyone else’s brain and pulse ticking over I’d recommend something of a potted history for these rare images, rather than letting the more obsessive of us get sidetracked at Wikipedia or Encyclopaedia Britannica. It’s not just about presentation in this case, it’s a matter of not frustrating or confusing the more inquisitive of your customers, and let’s face it, they are most likely to buy the t-shirts.

Still, those technical details asides, I very much doubt you’ll come across another label quite like Ivory Skies. Their vision of their world spans millennia as they endeavour to fuse the past with the present, and I am sure you will be pleasantly surprised when you see what I have selected for your perusal. So make sure you have your divining rod at hand, don your best toga, borrow a pair of wings from Icarus and set your psychic GPS for the stratosphere of taste as we take flight through the clean and crisp rarefied airs and graces of this near haute-couture high brow label. Read the story »

Win A Free Finroo Tee

I’ve been chatting to the extremely friendly people behind Finroo.com and just to let you know they have something very big planned, for now I’ll keep you in suspense but if you want to stay up-to-date with all the goings on at this fun and frolicking t-shirt community make sure you sign up to their monthly newsletter. What’s more if you do you will automatically be entered into their draw for a free tee, so I am sure many of you will be heading over there and taking a dip at Finroo!

Whilst you’re there make sure to check out their latest featured artist, Jason Scuderi has an off the wall style, something reminiscent of Dutch graffiti, kooky, strange and yet still iconic with a small ‘i’. I particularly like these two tees which offer something of a subversive slant on the usual bright and colourful designs of their ilk. Read the story »

Two New Tees From Hideout

Hideout T-Shirts have just released two new designs, you may recognise the name from our previous review at http://buy-tees.net/2009/03/freestyling-with-hideout-tees. They’re a British label famed amongst the BMX community for both their unique style and extensive sponsorship of the sport. They even make their own BMX videos!

Anyway the two new designs by Tash Walkerdine and Jon Moon, two of the three designers in the partnership. Both tees are available for £12 each and are already proving to be strong sellers in the line. Due to their rather snazzy Flash site I can’t link directly to their products, but you should have fun perusing through their deck of ‘t-shirt cards’ nonetheless Read the story »

A Hangover Cure From Xenotees

Buy Tees are Xenotees firm fans (aren’t we all?). They have a devoted following which we soon found out about when we first reviewed them in The Strangely Exotic Mind Of Xenotees. Their appeal is both quirky and alluring, their approach experimental, and their products top-notch. So of course we delighted to hear from Noelle the creative wizard behind the label who told us she was taking up the gauntlet and extending her range of silhouette shirts with her latest creation entitled ‘Too Much Party’. Not so abstract as her some of previous incarnations but definitely geared to a wider market!

Too Much Party T-Shirt

Guaranteed for a laugh (even if you are suffering the effects of a wild night out), the print features an official vintage Pabst bottle opener with a bunch of newbie bottle caps! Too Much Party is currently available in three colours (Slate, Cranberry Red and ladies versions in Heather Grey and Kelly Green) and plenty of different sizes but as usual stocks are limited so if you’re planning to use and wear one of these tees to full effect, take some Alka-Seltzer and rush on over there before they’re all snapped up!

We’re off to London for the weekend to do much the same thing, get hammered that is, so see you all Monday and have fun!

Do You Like The Taste Of Cotton? Cottonmouth.nl

Here’s a fascinating new label for the girls, a Netherlands fashion company called Cottonmouth have just released their first three limited edition t-shirts at their very very snazzy site Cottonmouth.nl. Founded by the original designers for another very popular Dutch tee label Sjeurt, they have expanded their horizons and ventured forth into the world of high female fashion, producing the best of the best quality tees for a discerningly artistic female market. Right now they have just three women’s t-shirts on offer but they’re well worth checking out, if only as a pointer for things to come. Expect stylish art shirts with an irreverent attitude to life, culture and style on the street. The store is available in Dutch and English and offers sweatshop free fashions (manufactured in USA and design, silkscreen printed tees and labels in the Netherlands), and all their orders are shipped in bio and recycled packaging, which is good to know.

Their first collection is entitled ‘MADemoiselle‘ and was inspired by the god of Pop Art Andy Warhol, yes I am a Warholian, a devotee of Andy’s work, (if you love Pop or Graffiti art, or any kind of contemporary graphic design you just can’t help it ;). Using portraits of women and girls of different decades on girly shirts Cottonmouth’s MADemoiselle them includes a scorcher of a tee, I love their take on Double Dutch - superbly designed and printed on a long comfortable T-shirt that features a stylish deeper plunged neck. Their experimentation with colours and cuts extends to Kiss me Cottonmouth, a tunic-dress that also doubles as a shirt and Fabulous Cottonmouth - a stylish long sleeved tee. All of their shirts are limited to just 20 pieces so if you’re female and want to wow your friends and acquaintances or just a stranger or two on the street I’d advice you rush over there now!

You can either order a tee at www.cottonmouth.nl or visit their store ‘KiBoCo’ in Bussum, the Netherlands. Whilst you’re at the site make sure to read up on all their latest info available at the Cottonmouth Community and stay informed about all their latest developments and designs

In case you’re living somewhere other than Holland their shipping costs are as follows:- The Netherlands: free shipping, Europe: € 4,00 and outside Europe: €12,50 which isn’t all that bad, although it would be nice if they encouraged a bulk deal, say buy three tees and offer free global shipping. or am I asking too much? Well actually it’s my gf who’s asking lol. Anyway let’s take a closer look at the MADemoiselle collection:- Read the story »

Spreadshirt Turns Green

Spreadshirt is working on improving its green credentials… they’re increasing their range of recycled and organic tees to meet the rising consumer demand.

Products of Nature

New Bamboo and Organic Apparel in April

Women’s “Earth Positive” T-shirt

The Earth Positive shirts from Continental offer a more progressive ethical apparel choice. They are:
1) Made with organic cotton (GOTS Certified)
2) Carbon Neutral
3) Fair Trade Certified (FWF Seal) Read the story »

Be A Twitter Star?? 20000 Followers Free!

Okay you have all heard of Twitter right? No? Well then you must be living on another planet! Twitter is a fabulous way of getting an enormous fan base fast, I use it for my graffiti site and will be promoting it in a big way very soon! The thing is most ideas for promoting Twitter are rather expensive and so I’ve joined Tweeter Getter and if you know what’s good for you you will too!

If you explode your following on Twitter you can almost guarantee it will increase the popularity of your t-shirt blog, site, store or in fact any kind of blog or site you can imagine!

Hope on board here and gather up to almost 20,000 Twitter followers for free!

Brand Battle Royale

Once again teemocracy is in full force effect at AlwaysUrbanBlog.com - come and join in the fun and vote for your fave t-shirt label in AUB’s latest brand battle! At present there are four t-shirt brands up against each other; Bad As Hell Clothing (who we’ve featured a few times at Buy Tees), Breathe On Apparel (who we’ve not come across before), Syditty Clothing (who offer a rather snazzy selection of designer women’s tees) and Someone Clothing (who we will definitely be featuring in the future!).

You don’t have to sign up to vote but AUB will need an email addy, of course they say it’s to make sure there’s only one vote per person but:-

If you had a 100 different emails you could probably cheat.
I.P address tracking is a far better way of preventing cheating.
It’s a sneaky way of building up their mailing list, still can’t blame them I suppose.

Anyway it’s a great chance for your favourite t-shirt brand to get a heap load of exposure, well I say that but looking at AUB’s traffic statistics right now they’d all get around ten times more with a review on our blog but hey, the more the merrier. (Yes I’m not being as kind as I could but I had a rough night last night hah).

So here are the rules:- By voting in the Brand Battle, you are opting into the AlwaysUrban.com email list. Expect results and a pile of other emails to boot in your inbox?

Vote For Your Favourite Brand
You must enter a valid email
You only get to vote once
Voting ends 03 / 16 / 09

So let’s take a look at the tees AUB featured to entice you to vote… Read the story »