Three Cheers for Eco Gear!

I’ve featured ecological t-shirt sites at Buy Tees before, but Canadian-based Eco-Gear.ca has to be the most ethical and ecologically aware t-shirt manufacturer and printer in the world. I was going to wait until I’d collated a few more sources for organic t-shirt suppliers/printers because I’ve had a few requests for more lists, but I couldn’t let this wait.

Here’s a quick rundown of Ecogear’s amazing ethical and environmental credentials:

- recycled materials in pre-consumer cotton clippings and recycled water bottles( 65% cotton and 35% recycled PET )
- least water and energy needed to produce the fabric
- no bleach or dyes used. Their colours are from the first life cotton clippings.
- no land use for agriculture or need for deforestation
- for their printing processes, instead of being back end conscious and filtering all wastes, they are front end conscious and only use dyes that are either organic or water based.No PVC, pthalates or APEOs.

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Charity T-Shirt from Psnob.com

I’m not quite sure what a Psnob® is but I’m guessing it might be short for ‘pretentious snob’, although the latest offering from the popular women’s clothing label at Psnob.com. Just because you offer high-end fashion couture for women doesn’t mean you and your customers don’t want to give back to the community, and that’s exactly what psnob® are doing until ‘Labor Day’, women can declare being a psnob® and help some of Atlanta’s neediest communities. Purchase a tee for $25.00 and a portion of the sale goes to Hands on Atlanta’s Gusto event, “A Taste for Volunteering”, September 5, 2008. For more information on psnob® and how to make purchases, log onto, www.psnob.com, and to find out more about Hands on Atlanta, or “A Taste for Volunteering” log onto, www.handsonatlanta.org

Psnob® have also set up a unique scheme whereby they allow organisations to auction off unique items from Rebecca Robinson’s collection to the highest bidder before part of the proceeds raised are contributed to one of many good causes listed at the site. As a matter of interest I’ve tracked down Psnob at Cafepress.com but you won’t find this featured t-shirt there! Read more

Divine Tees at Bad as Hell Clothing

Charles Wu of BadAsHellClothing.com sent me a mail recently introducing his new site, I’m pretty well known for my love/hate (love winning / hate losing) relationship with Threadless and a gamut of similar stores out there, I’ve written a comprehensive list of the top sites in a recent article, but you can never get enough of a good thing, and I have to concede this BAHC are certainly off to a great start! Excellent designs and a generous cash prize certainly grabbed my attention and look to have a great future in the market.

Apart from the cool logo the first thing to hit me was the high standard of design at BAHC, Charles obviously feels the same as he’s picked six winners for his first month’s trading and every one of them is a real cracker. The top prize is a generous $600 ($500 cash and $100 vouchers), plus residuals that can amount to $1000 if they sell 550 or more of your design, or $1 per t-shirt if they sell 150. So well worth submitting your latest tees if you’re after some cash and kudos.

By the way check out the crazy logo, Charles can certainly practice what he preaches as BAHC so be sure you submit your very best works to get a crack at the top prize! Anyway on with the current winners at Bad As Hell… Read more

New Designs on Death at Dance Party Massacre

Dance Party Massacre was launched in Boston, MA in the fall of 2007. Created by Alex Dakoulas it came to be after many nights of dancing in kitchens, walks in the dark, and horror movies with friends. Here’s a rundown on a few of their t-shirt releases, and be warned, they’re a strange bunch who seem to be fixated with death and the dance floor. I’m not sure if this is the kind of thing I should be encouraging so don’t take it too seriously if you happen to be a dangerous nutter who loves clubbing, it just won’t stand up in court.

I like their dualistic fatalistic/optimistic approach to life, I’m guessing they’re aiming their wares at a younger crowd, they even include a few bandanas in their collection, although the designs themselves aren’t too hardcore (don’t expect graphic blood and guts on your chest), and the message is loud and clear every time. Read more

Football T-Shirts… because soccer ain’t real!

I’m no big football fashion fan, perhaps it’s the shirts that most UK clubs offer. More than likely it’s all due to a succession of lost Saturday mornings at the tender age of eight, a divorcee dad who worked Saturdays, and the knowledge that however much I wanted to like the game I just wasn’t going to get any better at it. The same can be said for most sports, it’s ironic but if someone did a survey I’m sure they’d find many people in the design and arts trade actually fail miserably at sports. Could it be that a lack of hand eye co-ordination steers your career towards the arts, and too much sways you towards sports? That would be mad.

Anyway first point, ’soccer’ - the word itself totally and utterly sucks, just because a small minority of the world (or at least a lesser population than Europe or China), who happen to live in North America choose to call an offshoot of Rugby ‘American Football’ doesn’t mean the rest of world have to tag along. I’d love to see the word deleted from the dictionary, it’s outdated nonsense. Soccer as a term has been sidelined since the 1950’s, it’s so old school it’s painful. The world has moved on, these days we’ve so many countries competing in the game that it truly deserves to be called by it’s true name, football. Stuff anyone who doesn’t agree, you’re outnumbered. Read more

Ethical T-Shirts Supporting Communities Worldwide

I’m going to feature a few t-shirt stores that stretch their budget just that little bit further than your usual label. Over the last few years more and more charities, progressive arts communities and even businesses have realised exactly how powerful t-shirt fashions can be when you have a good cause or message to propagate. I include businesses in the mix because they too know it makes sense to align themselves with worthier pursuits than the mere accumulation of wealth and power. The consumer is more savvy than ever, the choice they face, especially when shopping online is almost insurmountable. Charities used to sell second-hand goods for pennies in most rundown high streets throughout the eighties and nineties here in the UK.

Things have moved on and nowadays you’ll find many major charities have branched out into all sorts of merchandising. Forget Christmas cards and gift tags, we’re talking desirable bang up-to-date underground fashion here, not smelly old sweaters and handbags in a bargain bin, you could almost say that the idea of charity itself has become fashionable. We’ve moved a long way since those first Live Aid t-shirts of the eighties, not everything can be summed up in a slogan and some of the following sites may offer you a surprise or two, think glamour on a budget, subtle persuasion, and a growing underground appeal and you’re halfway there. Read more

The Downfall of the V-Neck

In fashion everything rises and falls, be it skirts, shorts, or even plunging v-necks, but when I came across this article recently I realised it’s happened, women have got their way and now heterosexual men have become so feminised that they’re buying t-shirts from women’s clothing stores. So what happened to man, why is he so terrified of looking male? Because women, or rather those he desires, demand it.

It’s a sad sad sight to see, there’s even a Flickr page dedicated to the phenomenon, and most conjecture points to the trend as yet another sign that woman has finally superseded man in the sex wars, there aren’t any men left, or rather, we’re all too embarrassed to admit it. Yes I’m male, I’m straight and I don’t use a pantheon of specialised beauty products (including eyeliner these days), and I don’t wear plunging necklines, if I was female, if I had a decent cleavage, perhaps I would, but why would I want to reveal that particular part of my chest anyway? If I had decent pecs I’d make sure that people got an eyeful at the beach perhaps, i.e stripped to the waist and lazing in the sun. But not on the way to work, or on a night out with the lads, or in most situations I can possibly think of, plunging isn’t necessary.

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Forget Facebook. Linked In is for Fashion Professionals!

I’ve just spent the weekend testing the absolute limits of my Macbook, attempting to develop some of my most complex and extravagant designs yet, and no matter what I do the processor is struggling. So whilst I wait a while for my graphics suite to groan into action I think this would be an opportune moment to introduce you to LinkedIn.com - the Facebook for professionals, and in this case t-shirt professionals.

I am not really one for social networking as it happens, I have joined many, I submit my posts to quite a few social bookmarking sites and even drum up a little support for Threadless votes on a few of them, but when it comes to the t-shirt industry it’s all boiled down to pot luck so far. The thing is many networks paint a rather broad stroke when it comes to niche markets and industries, I’ve even found myself starting t-shirt related groups (with few takers) because most systems inherently avoid specific niches and favour communities such as ‘fashion’ or even ‘celebrity fashion’ over designer t-shirts. Read more

Wave T-Shirt at Threadless

(Reader slaps hand against forehead in disbelief) I’m at it again, at Threadless, doing my thing, and what appears to be an extremely unpopular thing at that. I’ve taken quite a few knocks at Threadless.com - I’ve hardly gathered any support and I doubt I’m making friends there. My partner Christina wants to convince me there’s some kind of conspiracy going on there, and it’s all down to writing this blog.

I know it’s far less complicated than that, my designs just aren’t good enough to compete on the world stage, which is fine, I can live with that, or rather I can work with that. Avoid all-out puns wherever possible is my first advice, they don’t seem to appreciate much of that at Threadless, and if at all possible be an expert illustrator, which will probably take another 20 years in my case. Threadless.com is becoming an addiction for me, I’ve got it bad man, have you got a few votes you can spare me buddy? Read more

Stripped Down Design at Take Off Clothing

I got an email from Raymond Koo of Take Off Clothing yesterday looking for a quick shout, I’ve noticed his work featured at a few other review sites which kind of knocked the wind out of my sails, I don’t like to repeat news unless I can get a new angle on it, but I genuinely appreciate what the guy is doing, so here we go.

Koo is a t-shirt designer based in Australia and has eight t-shirts in his collection, but he’s playing with some pretty snazzy t-shirt colours so we can forgive him (for now). Yes I would like to see a greater range of designs, but you can already see the artistic direction Koo’s taking. I’m sure that his range will build over the coming months, a slow burner with strong potential as far as I can see, give him time and I am sure this collection will stand true. Read more

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