Their styles are interchangeable, both Aled Lewis and Glennz being masters of graphic design, sticking to the old adage that ‘less is more’ both manage to convey t-shirt designs packed with humour and artistic reference without cluttering their work with excessive details and effects. Pure as purest vectors can be. The only real difference I can spot is that Alex has a decidedly more British sense of humour, featuring such British icons as The Tardis from Doctor Who, medieval humour and old school punk rock in the form of a male chicken.

Aled doesn’t have his own store as such however you’ll be relieved to know that all his works are available as winning designs (sometimes in collaboration with others) at Threadless and Shirt.Woot. Let’s take a look at some of Aled’s funniest creations and see exactly why this guy may become the new t-shirt king of comedy!

It Came Out of Nowhere Tee

Perfect, funny, original, what more can I say? The divine blend of two time travel classics results in a hilarious t-shirt design entitled It Came Out of Nowhere. Available now at Shirt.Woot for $15 in S to XL for women and S to 3XL for men.

Smoke and Mirrors Tee

I’ve heard of ‘puppet politics’ but this is getting ridiculous! Aled Lewis has managed to clear up the conspiratorial question to exactly who pulls the strings in government once at for all! Unfortunately (as will be the case for many of Aled’s Smoke and Mirrors tee at Threadless originally offered for just $10 in sizes XS – 2XL for women and XS to 3XL for men has sold out!

Not as Far as You Think Tee

Before you get too excited yet again this one is sold out, this review is fast turning into a futile exercise for anyone after his work, however I’m sure the head’s up will mean you will definitely all be keeping your eyes peeled for new arrivals! Not as Far as You Think is based upon yet another conspiracy, this time regarding the Moon Landing. I did see a rather convincing spoof video on Youtube recently that featured a few studio lights crashing about as the astronauts went on a walkabout – who knows – I learned recently that you can’t see the flag, jeep or modules from a powerful telescope. Then again I learned that from another nut lol. Anyway as usual no chance in a million years of getting hold of this beauty (unless popular demand decrees otherwise. You could have got this tee for $10 in all sizes a while back, still if enough people rant at this page it might be re-released!

Terrible Beast From a Bygone Age Tee

This design is actually for sale! If you own a t-shirt brand or want to start up one here’s your chance, with Aled Lewis on your books I guarantee you label will rise the ranks of power within months. This guy is as funny and talented as they come, and seeing as how big Glennz has made it these days, no doubt the same will apply to Aled Lewis before long. Entrepreneurial? Contact the designer here.

As far as t-shirts go this guy makes me proud to be British, which I must admit is a rarity these days. Check out his site for more designs, tees, and do take a look at his Flickr page, plenty more fun to be had there too!

Not only does he sell t-shirts by the bucketful, his following around the world has continued to grow and grow, he even offers a collection of free iPhone wallpaper these days, so even if you find yourself proverbially naked, i.e not dressed in a Glennz tee, then you can always turn to your iPhone for a quick fix of Glennz unique surrealist view on life.

Anyway, here’s the latest news from Glen, he’s set up a voting section at his site, which essentially means he’s handing over the power to the people! If you want to see any of his latest designs printed up then vote, if you don’t then don’t! I’ve already checked a few myself, I was amazed at how many were sitting on the sidelines, and so just as a teaser I thought I’d feature a few of my personal favourites here. But if you want to wear any of these, get down there and vote, it’s the only way a teemocracy can work :p

Wind Farmer by Glennz

An Eco Tee?

Fast Funeral by Glennz

More Macdeath than Macbeth.

Feeding Time by Glennz

Don’t tease the Royals, they were born that way.

Easy Money by Glennz

Every time you kill a fairy a dentist weeps.

Tourists by Glennz

Brains over brawn.

Let’s start from the beginning, the very beginning. Now, if you believe in fate, hey you have to believe in something, then you’re probably not the most ardent fan of coincidence. I’m not, in this grizzled addled brain of mine I like to cling on to the small hope that perhaps some things in life have a purpose, and that on those few occasions you should grab life by both horns and wrestle it to the ground.

Now, human beings are complicated creatures, they have individual lives and emotions, each has their own perception on why we are here and what we should be doing, and that means that a lot of us will never meet and if we do we will never agree on the most fundamental precepts of existence. Sometimes that’s a good thing, it means avoiding wars and most painful experiences in life, but sometimes it can be a real shame, glancing back and realising you’ve missed a great opportunity to help (in some small way) others find their way in modern life and all that it entails.

i want to introduce you to two guys, two very different men, both have a love of t-shirts, both want to find their way in the industry, and until recently neither had any idea of the other’s existence.

Bomb G aka Bombardier Darren Gray has led a fascinating life, here’s how he introduced himself to me and his website www.BombgTshirts.co.uk – “Many people say that a web site name has to be relevant to the products or services you sell, others say it needs to be wacky and way out there… I had this mad idea of a web site that sold pre-designed T-Shirts whilst was serving as a Bombardier in the Royal Artillery, the abbreviation for Bombardier is Bomb and my surname ‘Gray’. I was known as Bombardier Gray, an old soldier who was coming to the end of his time and well known among the senior ranks, I was often referred to as ‚ÄúBomb G‚Äù and as my site sells t-shirts what better a name than Bomb G T-Shirts.”

Coincidentally (or not depending on your belief system) I received another email that day from Mark Freeman, a creative soul with a distinctly superior talent for draughtsmanship. Here’s what he had to say, “I would greatly appreciate it if you would be able to review my website and its designs. The site is relatively new and still within its infancy but includes many of my own original designs with areas to control and customise all products in several of my online shops. My website can be found at: www.rebirth-creations-clothing.co.uk. Please check it out and email back if you would like to include a review of the site on your website. It would really be beneficial for me as I’m only a small time and cannot afford real and valued advertisement. Thank you for reading this, Rebirth Creations Owner, Mark Freeman.”

Mark is a slave of Spreadshirt, a corporation that I have less and less respect for each day, they like their competitors treat their designers like dirt, they take the bulk of the profit, all of the traffic and leave their greatest assets to struggle with responsibility of marketing their designs in a dog-eat-dog world of t-shirt sales. No matter how many embeddable widgets they offer, there’s no disguising the fact you’re at a Spreadshirt site and not an independent t-shirt producers site. What’s more Mark has made a terrible choice of domain names, two dashes and very little marketing savvy has most likely left this site at the bottom of the Google listings for quite a while. Then again take a look at a couple of Mark’s designs, they really are his saving grace :-

Excuse the tiny images, that’s just one of the problems with Spreadshirt – they simply don’t encourage bloggers to feature their products or images, f you want to buy any of the above as Spreadshirt t-shirts visit www.rebirth-creations-clothing.co.uk for more info, Mark also sells products (including sneakers) through Zazzle too – so if you’re after any of these there are your options, there are a few other designs too incase you care to take a peek. My main problem with Mark (apart from the severe limitations of the site) is the fact that this artist has no theme, his collection is too disparate for my liking, but that’s not the point, that can be fixed, taking his talent somewhere that will be appreciated had by now become my priority.

Bomb G (Darren) had a completely opposite problem, the guy is as enigmatic as they come, he has a story to tell, a former war photographer and bombardier who already has a successful online store at www.garrisonpri.co.uk selling military presentations, clothing and accessories. What’s more when it came to creating www.BombgTshirts.co.uk jit took Bomb ages to find the right designer to create a professional set up he could be proud of. It’s a very smart site but it only has one problem, the t-shirts there, for the most part, are kind of sub-standard. He too had a problem with the theme of his label, he had a concept in mind, had the store built and then needed to source the right designers to create the designs he needed to set his site off with a bang. He’s made sales but to be honest (and Darren later admitted the same) the t-shirts he’s selling right now jsut don’t cut it. I’ve picked out a few of the better ones, but in all honesty I’d never normally feature most of these…

actually like this one, Peace Tank is a great piece of graphic design, and in essence it’s exactly the direction that Bomb G should be taking, unfortunately this approach is scant on the site to say the least. Darren commissions designers and for the main part it seems he has little creative control over the project, which is a real shame, because his basic concept of what his collection should be is sound, very sound indeed.

Now, just to prove a point I’m going to show you some of the bad ones (be warned they are so bad I won’t link to them) …

I just can’t show you anymore, it’s not Darren’s fault though, he didn’t design them, it’s down to the lowlifes out there who make money licensing tees, they snag every new t-shirt store owner out there and sell them the same old jokes, the same old dodgy slogan-based tees that places like Busted Tees dumped years back.

Now I hate refusing to review t-shirts, but if I find the quality of either the site or its products are not up to scratch I have to deny them a post at Buy Tees. I just don’t see the point of wasting your time or mine, there are so many great designers and labels out there it really wouldn’t be fair. But something about these two guys made me decide I needed to do a little bit of matchmaking. The fact is they couldn’t be more different if they tried, Mark has a fantastic drawing style and Darren has a lot of business savvy, a great site and a potentially fantastic concept for a t-shirt store, i.e cool military style tees for a Banksy-loving, anti-Bush, post Iraq generation of artistic media-aware trendies.

Take a look at what I wrote to each of them next and beware these are long old emails, the first one is to Mark of Rebirth Creations and before you read these, take a look at the example images I used to convince them of the theme, quality of design and products their alliance could eventually produce.

The above images are of Banksy’s Bomb Hugger, Robit’s ‘Chance of Reign‘ t-shirt and Glennz Tees’ classic ‘Ground Defences‘. I used these to argue my case with both Bomb G and Mark.

Now the email to BombG :-

Let’s just say the response (after some initial hesitation on both sides) was miraculous, I’m glad to announce the two are beyond initial talks and are now discussing the details of design and product theme for the future of what I and they hope will be a major new t-shirt label. Fingers crossed I’ll be updated when new designs arrive and have to admit I’m looking forward to what they’ll produce.

In case you’re sitting there scratching your head, I did it for the love of t-shirts, I haven’t got a cut in the company, Darren has said I’ll have free tees for life if this takes off, but I’ve told him I won’t take that offer seriously! All I know is if you’re there at the right time and the right place, what the hell, lend a hand, help give birth to a new t-shirt design house and who knows, the mysterious universe of karma might pick you out one day and give you a break.

Now everyone, whilst you’re feeling hopeful about life and everything in general, go and buy my art haha.

Anyway, here’s the latest fab tee from Glennz called ‘Puzzled Putter’. I’m not too keen on golf but I do love the M.C Escher twist in this design…

It’s available now in Men’s (up to 3XL) and Women’s (up to XL) in green for $19.95 from Glennz.com

In case you’re curious about the mention of M.C. Escher earlier, don’t worry he’s not the latest rapper to hit the hip hop scene, he’s not even a golfer, he’s a dead genius… this is ‘Relativity‘ by M.C Escher. If impossible geometry is your thing, as I can tell it’s Glennz’s, then check this out:-

Ground Defenses

A hilarious take on the old retro arcade classic Space Invaders, one of the ground troops is busy marking up his kills on the side of his ground defence vehicle, and yes he’s already got two flying saucers (which means plenty more bonus points). If you fancy a trip back through memory lane, (or if you have no idea what I’m talking about) you can have a little play of it here to refresh those fingers and thumbs. But before you start whacking aliens maybe you should get the appropriate uniform here.

I was more of a Galaxian man myself but then again there was always a far longer queue for Space Invaders at the chip shop.

Now for a little more nostalgia…

Before Stardom

Moving along here’s one for all you Muppets/Sesame Street fans out there, I always hated Kermit, with his cornball tunes and sentimental jibes, I preferred the weird scientists Dr. Bunsen Honeydew and Beaker his long suffering assistant who was treated as a human guinea pig each week, usually resulting in a calamitous mutation of some kind. However I did enjoy this t-shirt, Before Stardom, which depicts the earliest beginnings of Kermit The Frog. Perhaps Glennz should make a frog spawn version for the kids :p

Experimental Music

Experimental Music is a simple but effective play on words, and results in a rather snazzy t-shirt design, I’d like to see a luminous version of this but you can’t have everything. I, my partner Christina and many others of our generation received a chemistry set as kids, perhaps our parents thought we’d be able to save the world, cure diseases, or at least create something to remove the chocolate ice cream stains from numerable items of our clothing.

As with indoor fireworks, the results were never too dramatic, in fact even if you did manage to mix every chemical in the box together you’d still see little more than a small blob of fizzing goo. Nothing blew up however much you tried. I doubt they sell as well these days, besides consoles and games, the Internet, mobile phones and designer clothing to distract the latest generation, the mollycoddling society we live in today, the fears of terrorist attack, and gawd knows what else has probably put paid to dangerous experimentation. Kids these days are more likely to experiment with drugs than a chemistry set.

Which is probably where the notion of experimental music comes in, most of it sounds like a mess to me, perhaps I’m too old and set in my ways, or perhaps you need to be on drugs to play or listen to this stuff. I went through a phase of appreciating some experimental 1960′s jazz, but I’m sure it was in order to impress a girl. I do still have a soft spot for Brian Eno‘s sounds, the guy behind Roxy Music and a lot of Bowie‘s earlier works, but my Eno collection hasn’t seen the light of day in years :/

First up I’ve just won the BlogDumps.com T-Shirt and Logo Design Contest!

Woot! I’ve won 200 Entrecard Credits and a t-shirt, but best of all it’s brought more attention to Buy Tees and of course my t-shirt designs in general. It’s got me in the mood to do a few custom logo tee designs if the demand is out there, and so if you’re interested I can sort you out a design for just $50 which is a piddling £25 here in the UK so get them whilst they’re hot! I take payments by Paypal to avoid the hassle and would take around a week depending on my workload to create one for your blog/site/company. T-shirts make great prizes for any purpose, as you can tell from the interest built up at BlogDumps.com recently, so well worth a try. If you’d like a custom logo/t-shirt design for $50 contact me at info@webdesignweb.com and I’ll come up with my best I can for you. If you don’t like the design, you don’t have to buy it, it’s all valid experience for me as I’m opening up my old web and graphic site WebDesignWeb.com and need to fill the portfolio with some more recent logo designs.

Glennz, my favourite t-shirt designer at Threadless.com has redesigned one of his classic t-shirts called ‘Secret Habit’ which has to be one of his funniest, featuring Ronald McDonald in disguise eating a pizza. Once again Glennz only hints at this subject and manages to avoid all the copyright issues that so
many designers have to deal with when using famous iconography, you can’t use the Golden Arches for instance, but clowns’ boots and stripy leggings are
just as much of a give away.

I sometimes imagine what on earth do the CEO’s of McDonalds offer to eat at their AGM, Veal or Suckling Pig Burgers and Champagne Shakes I’m guessing. I have a real issue with most fast food, not because of the health issues, I know it’s my fault if I decide to eat junk, but a stack of ethical, ecological, and social arguments against fast food chains. I won’t harp on here as you’ve heard it all before, but I will say that with the price of oil rising everyday I doubt that fast food will be quite so cheap or convenient as it was in the future. So if you are going to Super Size, do it whilst you can still afford it lol.

Are CafePress.com giving into Spreadshirt? A kinda stingy offer from CafePress.com next – I know I should include more t-shirt discounts at Buy Tees, but in all honesty there are so many blogs out there doing it I don’t see the point, if you want discounts check this list of t-shirt reviews blogs for a whole heap of cheapie links! Anyway I’m pointing this one out because it proves to me that CP don’t give a hoot about their international customers. Perhaps they are finally caving in and accepting that SpreadShirt have the European monopoly now, especially as they’re accepting DTG designs nowadays.

Free Shipping* from Cafepress.com – Coupon Code – FREESUMMER
* Enjoy Free Economy or Standard shipping for purchases of $65 or more, excluding shipping charges and applicable sales tax. Delivery address must be within the United States. (wth?) All orders will be Economy shipping, unless the order is not eligible for Economy shipping (e.g., order exceeds Economy
weight restrictions). Coupon code must be entered at check out. Promotion starts on July 8, 2008, at 9:00 a.m. (PST) and ends on July 20, 2008, at 11:59 p.m.
(PST). Cannot be combined with any other offers, discounts or coupons.

So what – forget the rest of the world and be done with it? Cafepress you really do suck. I use them because they provide the USA with cheap tees for those who don’t want to spend money on quality, and luckily my sales there cover my premium stores costs (how about offering premium stores for free CP?) but in all honesty it’s more a PR exercise to keep my profile as a t-shirt designer out there in the USA, I never expect an income from it, I think a lot of CP designers feel the same, especially those from Europe. The only way to make real money at CP is to design and upload thousands (duh… bulk uploader CP?) of USA flag and I heart City Tees and then spam Google with as much Adsense as possible. Not really my idea of a design career but there you go.

If you want free shipping in Europe then check this out..

Seems like Spreadshirt are taking over Europe once and for all!

I’ll cut this one short as I’m in the midst of writing yet another ultimate top list lol! I know how many are there out there? This will be for Threadless Clones or rather T-Shirt Voting Sites, so add my newsfeed to keep up-to-date, wontcha?

[TAGS]Cafepress,Spreadshirt,Blog Marketing,Glennz,Threadless,T-Shirt Contest,T-Shirt Vouchers[/TAGS]

Even if you don’t think you’ve heard of Glennz (Glenn Jones) the t-shirt designer, you have, and if you haven’t, this is planet Earth and the year is 2008. I doubt any person alive with a love of t-shirts hasn’t seen one of his works. I’m sure we could debate whether this is art or not for years to come, but, as far as fulfilling all the requirements of classic t-shirt design, Glennz has to be the man.

I know this review will come across as a total creepfest, but I really don’t care, Glennz has to be one of the few t-shirt artists that made me believe I could make it in this industry. His works are some of the most memorable I have ever seen, sure they aren’t grunge, they’re not eroded, they’re not filled with vector shields and gothic text, or experimental photo-montage techniques, but those are all fads and fashions that will pass and eventually return again.

The world of design like the world of art follows some very basic principles in order to maintain their essential position in our culture. They enable us to visualise that which cannot be understood, or has been misunderstood. They must create a new iconography for each generation, they must speak to both the mass and the individual. Yet beneath all the diatribe, each artist, each designer, has to have their own distinct vision and a wealth of skill and technique to achieve it.

I studied a rather strange little Arts Degree course way back when, the overriding factor in the conception and creation of any piece was the ability to justify the choice of materials, the subject matter, the design approach, and its final production as a work of art/design. It was called Conceptual Media back then. I have no idea of the current watchword as I’ve practically abandoned the high-arts world in an attempt to prove my head tutor wrong once and for all. All I know is that Glennz is already doing that job for me.

Glennz is the closest the t-shirt world has to a ‘Banksy‘. Like Banksy he’s challenging our perceptions of the world, like Banksy he is expressing his ideas through a low-art medium, one creates graffiti and the other t-shirts. One is politically charged, the other culturally and perceptually subversive. If Banksy is preaching from a ghetto hell, then Glennz is creating debate in a surrealism of suburbia. Like Banksy Glennz work seems incredibly familiar, even when witnessing a work of his for the first time you have that niggling feeling that this idea should have been expressed a long time ago.

There are only two reasons why Glennz won’t ever receive the adulation that Banksy does, the first is that the Arts world has an inbuilt aversion to anything fashion-related. I can’t blame them to some extent, at college I couldn’t stand the fashion students, they honestly were idiots, (obviously this was a small sample) – I love great clothes, but the bitching and catty behaviour of those people about little more than who could add the most sequins to their ill-fitting garbs held me back from the fashion world for many years.

I went into advertising (yuck) and finally graphic design, it would be over a decade before I found myself back here. Glennz is one of the reasons why. The second is that he isn’t politically charged or posing as a champion for the oppressed, good intentions aside, as Banksy finds is work earning him more and more, he’ll have a harder time simply being ‘one of the people’. Glennz is one of the people, he’s just a guy with a some graphics software, he isn’t creating a media spectacle, he’s making t-shirts, and very very cool ones at that

This guy is a genius at vector design, his work is succinct beyond measure, I am a fussy $%^£^&$ and on a truly personal level, can usually only appreciate one or two works by any t-shirt designer, I can positively critique many designers, I can deconstruct an idea with glee, I am trained to do it, I can see references to artists in history where many will miss those finer points, but I rarely can sit back and hand control over to another. Except on this one occasion.

I received an email today from Glennz, and I have to admit it was kind of exciting, perhaps I need to get out more, but if there’s one person I wanted to get to know better in the t-shirt industry (apart from a very rich t-shirt printer with an unlimited advertising budget), it has to be Glennz. He asked me to write a quick feature about his latest work called Freak of Nature – another classic tee – features Gene Simmons of KISS fame, a crazy black and white excess of high-camp pop-rock has entered the gene pool :p Who knows what genetic experimentation you can buy if you have the cash, I can see Gene wanting one of these (hint Glennz).

In fact I was pretty impressed that Glennz had even bothered contacting me, perhaps I’m getting a little better known than I thought, I suppose Imagine a legion of fans out there bigging him up at every opportune moment. Either way, I don’t think one work is enough to showcase this guy, so let’s all take a wander through the mind of Glennz.

It’s a Bottle Jim! is one of my absolute all-time favourites, I am an old sci-fi fan, not so much a geek as a nostalgic (another banned sentiment at my arts course). For example as a child my parents went through a messy divorce, a friend at school (we were about 9) and his rich builder dad took pity on me, and they took me to see the UK premiere of Star Wars in 1977.

It was a big event and I’m sure there were plenty of stars there but all I remember is sitting there in front of a massive Leicester Square cinema screen and feeling like nothing would be the same again. I spent years watching reruns of old Star Trek episodes with my Dad on a wintry Sunday evening (the only day he could see me) and delving into the whys and wherefores of if, how, and when we will ever travel the stars.

In the 1970′s Dad bought a pewter sculpture of the USS Enterprise from Franklin Mint in Bromley, Kent. It even has phaser cannons made from rubies and an emerald dome. It’s over 20 years later and these days he talks more about his final time on earth, he’s only in his 60s but he is in a bad way. His legs are shot from an industrial accident in the early 80s, besides that he’s grieved for so many friends and family who’ve passed that almost every conversation ends with him removing the Enterprise from its box and showing me part of my inheritance. I’d rather keep my dad, I’d rather see that ship proudly placed on his mantelpiece, but if there is something guaranteed to remind me of Dad, it will always be the Starship Enterprise. Glennz knows the affection that many guys young and old feel for this craft, to imbue it with history, to seal it in a bottle, to preserve its memory, for me is like preserving the memory of my Dad and myself in those heady days of the 1970′s.

Scrap Metal is the first t-shirt I remember seeing and thinking hey that’s a Glennz, his style is immediately recognisable, it has a clarity of idea and style that is usually only matched by the most expensive of advertising campaigns. Imagining one guy by his laptop creating these designs one after another makes me wonder how long has big business got before it’s toppled by talented individuals like Glenn. Yes it’s a reference to Star Wars and I love it, this is the only other way you’ll get me nostalgic about Sci-fi, through the medium of Star Wars iconography.

When I first began designing t-shirts I got a bit of grief off Nintendo for producing a Wii and iPod related design called iiPwn – Apple didn’t say a thing, anyway I realised the troubles with anything even remotely associated with copyright design. Glennz is a master at retaining the recognisable without ever crossing the line of legality. George Lucas can only stand back and admire (or in horror) accept that this is a fitting end for his Star Wars franchise. The first trilogy was fantastic, the last three awful, I don’t care what the Star Wars experts say, it should have ended back in the 80s, (same goes for Indiana Lucas!).

Beyond the cultural references is an incredible understanding of detailing the effects of natural forces, physical stress and deformation of material under extreme conditions. It may seem easy to create an image like this, but without exactly the correct perspective and balance of detail versus treatment, this work would have failed miserably. You know what it is and you know what’s happened, the work explains itself immediately. ‘The Force’ (of t-shirt design) is strong within Glennz. I’ve just realised I haven’t bought this, I really should, I know it so well I feel like it’s already hanging in my wardrobe :0

Endangered Species is the slickest environmental t-shirt I’ve ever seen, I don’t like Sushi, yes I admit it, but if there’s one thing I know most glamorous types in the city love, it’s eating raw fish at the end of the evening. The irony is they’re running out, the fish stocks are falling, perhaps they should just open the restaurants in the middle of the Japanese Ocean so you can pick what you like as it swims by?

I’m sure there are plenty of pro-Sushi people out there who will eat it till they drop, or rather the fish population does, I like fish, cooked though, and even our lowly British Cod is almost at an end. Britain as many other countries than Japan are contributing to the problem.

The fact is the future of food like fuel is in doubt, erratic weather cycles reduce harvests and make it impossible to predict how much we can produce. Pollution and over-fishing means the same will apply to the sea, no matter how many farms we create, the damage has been done. Eventually we’ll all have to rely more and more on local resources, if I could afford a house with some land I’d be growing my own organic food at a slither of the price the supermarkets charge, even selling the surplus on to neighbours or better still bartering for other essentials.

I’ve made a small step in an attempt to reduce the enormous carbon-footprint of our industry by encouraging people to print their t-shirts locally, (plug coming up…) and have set up a free global directory for t-shirt printers at TshirtPrinter.org – I spent a few weeks entering the categories (gulp) and I hope that enough people get word of the site it will in some way encourage the industry to do better. I even feature organic t-shirt printers for free as a way of encouragement for printing companies to do better. Who knows word might spread :/

I adore the treatment used in Endangered Species, the colours and cold dead eye of the fish head really bring the design alive (ironically), with even just one hint of Manga style illustration and I think the message would’ve been lost. The style is more reminiscent of a funky 1960′s American cook book than a Japanese comic, and that for me makes it perfect.

Deflating Defences is yet another über subtle piece of design, seemingly innocuous but produced at a time when all Western political minds must be considering the prospects of war both now and in the future. On one level this is simply a very sweet design, perfectly executed (yet again), immediately recognisable, and an excellent use of iconic metaphor.

Part of me wonders if Glennz is scratching his head right now, perhaps there’s no message in any of works? My reply would be, if a t-shirt designer can make an ageing and very cynical post-conceptual installation artist wake up and cheer him on, then he must be doing something right, consciously or subconsciously (it is neither here nor there). The fact is everyone of the works I’ve reviewed will remain at the heart of the designer t-shirt Zeitgeist for many years to come.

So whichever way Glennz may lean, I can see the futility of war in this work, others may see their childhood, or a waste of a good bouncy castle, or just something nice for the kids, each to their own. All I know is that Glennz has a highly annoying habit (don’t worry Im just greening with envy here) of hitting the nail on the head every single time.

I don’t want to make life any more difficult for the guy, don’t have unrealistic expectations about what a t-shirt design can actually achieve in the outside world, it is after all just a t-shirt. But if you’re proud of your collection, if you truly know your t-shirts, you should check you actually do own a Glennz.

[tags]Glennz, Threadless, designer t shirts[/tags]