Tuck Into Pyknic’s Tees

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Here’s a rather tasty review for you featuring the fabulous t-shirts of Pyknic Clothing at www.pyknicwear.com – serving a great sense of humour alongside some fantastically well drawn designs, the two guys behind the label Andrew Marshall (aka The Chef) and Stephen Thompson aka (The Butcher) have created a unique branding concept that literally has their fan base eating out of their hands. Their slant on the t-shirt market has gone from strength to strength as they turned their backs on the traditional surf/skate market a few years back and headed off in a weird and wonderful alternate reality where fashion and food collide in a frenzy of colour and creative flair. Even their site is a veritable feast for the eyes, mocked up to closely resemble a retro diner, the graphics are smart, the impact immediate, the navigation a breeze, the prices highly competitive (check out their sale) – this label has their market nailed and are going from strength to strength with a wide range of retailers stocking their goods across the world in the USA, Europe, Australia and well just about anywhere you’d expect to find a cool t-shirt store. In fact even Hot Topic stock a few of their tees, so you know they’ve hit the big time, let’s hope the recession doesn’t begin to cut back on their plans for world domination, somehow I doubt it will make any difference.

Most of their designs, though conceptually conceived by Andrew and Stephen are illustrated by a variety of top artists under their wing, and it’s obvious by the startling diversity of style and composition that they’ve most certainly got an eye for talent. What’s more Pyknic are extremely adept at building a phenomenal brand with a wide variety of social networking hooks to pull in the punters including their blog, a popular Myspace page, Andrew’s Twitter as well as a whole heap of bands who adore their clothing that together make the Pyknic Family. They also offer a mailing list at their store so you can keep up with all the latest news on sales and if you really want to bug them for all they’re worth they openly invite your questions via AIM – their username is PYKNICwear. But before you do maybe you should check out exactly what all the fuss is about, so hand me your plate and I’ll pile it high with the best of the best from the crazily creative camp at Pyknic!

Sarnie Deluxe Tee

The Sarnie Deluxe tee is available for $24.98 in sizes small to large and is available for men and women. A totally crazy foodie tee (as you’d expect), this design reminds me of the sandwiches you’d expect to see in Scooby Doo, where Scooby and Shaggy would generally raid stranger’s fridges and larders to pile up the highest snacks they could make. Even as a kid I always wondered how on earth they:

1) Had the time to prepare food when a variety of ghosts, ghouls, vampires, robots and other monsters (who were generally crooks in disguise – presumable with a multi-million dollar special effects budget).

2) Could fit them in their mouths, and exactly how did Scooby Doo manage to open up a can of wieners with his paws?

Anyway forget about Scooby and focus on the t-shirt (the reviewer reminds himself – although I can’t help thinking that Scrappy Doo ruined a beautiful thing). I love the composition of this tee design, it’s fantastically confident and individual in its appeal, I particularly like the detailing and especially the eyeballs which have obviously been added to freak out the trippers out there, although I have been to a few restaurants that serve sheep’s eyes, no I haven’t tried them. I’m not eating windows to an sheep’s soul, nor will I eat monkey’s brains, kangaroo testicles or anything along those lines. I maybe adventurous in my taste in t-shirts but when it comes to food I’ll stick to my usual junk. A cracking tee for anyone who feels peckish for a trippy combo of colour and design with a superb sense of humour to top off this feast of fashion.

Chef x Butcher Tee

Here’s one of the most subtle examples of self-promotion I’ve seen in a long long while. You might have noticed throughout all my reviews my aversion to logo t-shirts, sure include your logo, but make sure you have something worth branding is my argument. The fact is there’s another way of building a brand and this is it. Self-mythologising. Don’t create characters, be the characters, rock stars do it, film stars do it, artists do it, most haute couture fashion designers do it to some degree, so why not t-shirt designers? The Chef x Butcher tee features Andrew and Stephen’s alter-egos in all their gory glory, I love the old school comic art style of this tee, it kinda reminds me of Bill and Ted meets Creepshow, but a lot less dorky. Already you can see the attention to detail these guys pay to their products, the logo for this shirt being dramatically different than the previous, fitting in with the overall style of the composition, colour and concept. Shlock horror is a fantastic way to immediately engage a potential buyer after all. A powerful t-shirt, the Chef x Butcher tee is available for $24.98 in small and medium sizes.

Medusa’s Menu Tee

Another mad one, Medusa’s Menu features one of the freakiest waitresses you’re ever likely to meet. Britain is infamous for bad customer service but thinking about it America must be tops for the archetypal grump when it comes to greasy diners. I mean I’m getting all my information from movies here but as far as I can tell it seems the USA is populated by an inexplicably high number of moody old women who hate serving food, would rather have a smoke out back than eat it themselves (I guess that would be down to knowing exactly what the cook does all day in the kitchen out back) and have a penchant for slamming down plates, pouring coffee everywhere but the cup, and sneering with indifference when someone complains about dirty cutlery. Well that’s nothing, I mean a dodgy blue rinse is one thing but a head full of snakes and a stare that can turn any man to stone, that can’t be good for the profit margin. A perfect comedy combination brings ancient myth and ancient waitresses together in this hilariously conceived yet perfectly punky and potent design, it’s so retro, so cool. I can see this being a hit with a lot of different crowds, a taste of (old) new-wave rock B-52’s meets the Rockabilly culture, a mad psychedelic palette and crazy design all round, great stuff. Available for $24.98 in sizes small to large for men and women.

Space Snacks Tee

If you want the Moon on a stick then t-shirt is perfect for you, I can’t decide if this design reminds me more of The Jetsons or a Polish cartoon for the kiddies in the height of the Cold War, perhaps a little of both. I love the sentiment here, universal greed, eat everything before someone else does. There’s an ultra subtle logo placement on this one to which appeals to me greatly. It’s funny how nostalgic designers get after the collapse of a corrupt political system, I suppose it was (amidst all the corruption) a handful of lofty ideals (heartily encouraged by a plethora of TV programming at the time) to conquer the universe, seeing as the planet was under nuclear stalemate at the time. There were just two superpowers back then, the USA and the USSR, and each was desperate to do anything and everything first. These days the remains of the USSR i.e Russia and the USA have to compete with a whole load of other countries out there including China and India on both counts. If it’s big and it fires off at great distances you can bet someone somewhere will be riding it too. Virgin (which is after all a British company) are actually offering reservations on their yet-to-be built Galactic range of space/aircraft which charges a whopping £200k to take a quick peek at the Earth from space and a moment of weightlessness before coming back down to normality (as it were) – I wonder if they’ll be offering similar refreshments as Pyknic have on offer? If only the Moon was made from cheese we’d not have to worry. Then again I’m sure if it was a race of giant mutant mice would be on their way here to wreak havoc. Space Snacks is available for $24.98 in sizes small and medium.

Funny, irreverent, as graphic as can be, get your belly and eyeful of colourful cartoon shenanigans at www.pyknicwear.com today!

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