KidRobot.com - Not Just For Kids (or Robots).

Designer Paul Budnitz designer and creator of Kidrobot is (and I quote) “the world’s premier designer and retailer of limited edition art toys and apparel”. Sure he’s blowing his own trumpet a little louder than most but the guy really does know what he’s doing. Kidrobot.com started selling their strange toys in 2002 and just as wacky line of urban wear in 2006 and have gone from strength to strength ever since. Read more

New York Style For The World At R.A.G

R.A.G Clothing opened its doors in NY in 1959 and has since expanded its number of stores to 5 locations across Manhattan. My partner came across RAG Clothing on a recent trip and was surprised (and relieved) to find their inimitable range of stylish designer t-shirts and urban wear are available online. They offer a great line in graphic art shirts although I’d say their men’s tees outclass the women’s by miles. There’s also a small selection of I Love New York tees for those of you who can’t quite afford a weekend fix of NY right now, though again they aren’t quite on the same level as their graphic t-shirts. Read more

One Punch Machine Gun Takes No Flak

If I was a New Yorker I’d make tees like One Punch Machine Gun Clothing at OPMG.biz and you know why? Their designs are the shiznit, and in this case it doesn’t boil down to the usual formula of great graphic style meets solid conceptualist thinking. Although they excel at both, the extra secret ingredient at OPMG is attitude, and they have heaps of it to spare. A New York attitude to creative fashion that takes no prisoners, and if they did they’d be the most probably be the most stylish escapees this side of penitentiary. Read more

Ugmonk Opens For Business

Jeff Sheldon of Ugmonk.com has just announced the release of his first three tees at his new designer t-shirt store. At the moment there are but three t-shirts on offer, but I have been assured plenty more are on the way. I wouldn’t normally feature a store with so little to offer (so far), however these tees do offer a slick and rather classic New York / Bauhaus Typography style that you don’t see around as much these days. Saying that they’re based in Vermont, which makes me think that Vermont may have less of a laid-back hippy fashion scene than I’d previously assumed.

Jeff created Ugmonk in response to the high saturation of cluttered design in the t-shirt fashion market, stripping back the redundant extremities of the over embellished style common to many labels at the moment, providing a stripped-back alternative, relying on the eternal qualities of line and composition. The first 100 of each of his designs include a limited edition screen-printed tag which is a very nice touch. Read more

Big Apple T-Shirt

Big Apple T-Shirt by Paul Baines

It’s funny how places can get nicknames, I checked out the origin of New York’s alter ego, and it seems the term was coined by NY jazz musicians of the 1930s and ‘40s, some say it’s to do with the depression and all the apple sellers on the streets, but I think the music scene would’ve been far more influential than a few fruit sellers. Besides there was some kind of crazy jazzy dance back then called the Big Apple too, so not surprisingly the name caught on.

There isn’t much to explain about the Big Apple T-Shirt except that it’s influenced by famous painting The Son of Man by René Magritte, a Belgian Surrealist with a knack for creating the iconic. You can probably recognise the influence straight away, there aren’t many images out there that obscure a portrait with a giant apple, then again, it could just be an average apple placed close to the viewer.

I have a strange kinship with New York, all it a long-distance relationship, okay yes, in a voyeuristic sense, I do love New York! I haven’t been there, I suppose I should go, my partner has and she enjoyed herself, but she wasn’t ecstatic, I knew why, we’ve been spoiled by a history of film, one tribute after another up until the 1980s when everything on location in New York was actually filmed in Vancouver and other less populated, less memorable cities. I suppose no where can live up to my expectations these days, it’s no one’s fault in particular, just the wealth of filmography that has used New York city as a backdrop to countless stories.

I’m sure plenty of New Yorkers will be rolling their eyes by now, it’s true, how can I tell what New York is like from across the Atlantic, well, I do know that every city I’ve lived in or visited has become busier, more crowded, more congested and more polluted than the last. It’s practical to create a megatropolis in the midst of an Industrial Revolution, even at the beginning of an Information Age, but soon, very soon people begin to realise they don’t need to commute, the oil crisis will speed up the process, and more and more lumbering behemoth corporations will experience a painful commuter burnout. Then we’ll see the rise of the local economy once more, a resurgence for convenience and practicality. Then New York, London and many other incredible cities can make some room, and all we’ll use them for is entertainment, the arts, cultural and historical experiences, trade, and shopping for luxury goods, it’s what they were built for in the first place. In times gone by the only people who lived in a city lived in squalor or owned a serious chunk of real estate. Funny how things always turn full circle if you wait long enough.

Big Apple T-Shirts from only $9.99!

Big Apple T-Shirts at CafePress.com only $9.99! There are plenty of other items
available organic tees, sweatshirts and hoodies too.

Big Apple T-Shirt at RedBubble.com available
from GBP £11.94 - USD $23.94