Now THAT is how you kick off a design competition!

1) Get lots of artists 2) Ask them to each draw a robot 3) Put them all together 4) Use metallic ink accents 5) Get more comments on your submission with the word ‘awesome’ in it than any other design 6) Win $5000.

I think its pretty funny that blogs (mostly me) have been making a big deal out of DBHs reward policy (i.e. big bucks) and then they end up giving it to a collaboration of 25 different artists (although Legion of Doom is actually just 2 people). Not that the money is all that important really, yes, it is an initial hook, but quality designs are going to be the true test of whether DBH can make it, and this truly is a quality design.

There’s also an interview with the Legion of Doom is you feel like a read.

Costiness=$19 URL

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I guess the sale came a lot sooner than I expected, since the sale is now upon us.

You know the deal, $10 tees (markdowns on other products), long waits for your tees to arrive, and everything selling out fast.

So if you want it, get on it.

Threadless

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I really do write about this thing way more than it deserves, especially as I’ll probably never be a visitor/patron of the store. Still, the latest updates does include a few interesting tidbits:

“There will only be 20 designs for sale in the store at any given moment. Each of the 20 designs gets its own special area complete with an LCD display cycling through various photos and close-ups of the design, comments from the original submission and other rad stuff. The designs for sale will change weekly, as will the store window.”

“The kicker is that - at the store - we will be launching the new tees the Friday before they get released on the website. While you won’t have access to our entire catalog from the store, you will have a head-start on what comes out on the website.”

They also say that they do plan to open more stores, in what they describe as artsy communities (San Fran, Austin, Boston [artsy?], Seattle etc.), which is cool, but seems to be reliant on how well the Chicago store goes, so I would describe it as a plan in a pretty loose sense.

Also, its pretty much 100% confirmed by Jake Nickell that there is going to be a $10 sale coming up very soon (so you might want to hold off on an order), my guess is that the theme this time will be for ‘back-to-school’ or simply as a celebration of the store opening.

Check out the whole blog post (and inevitable outpourings of Thread-love in comments) here.

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Presumably in a move to shift older stock, Ten Bills are offering some of their tees at the astoundingly low price of $5 a piece, which is so low that it actually tempts me to actually pay for a tee (me? paying? unbelievable!).

they’ve also got in some cool logo shaped keychains that are packed free with your order when you spend $30+, which means you have to buy 6 discounted tees to qualify for the freebie, crazy!

Ten Bills

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This tee is good enough, for me, its, good enough, for you, its gooooood enough, for youuuuu…

I had to do it, I just had to, and if you don’t know what I’m talking about, well, that’s fair enough, because this tee follows Kindred grand tradition of making tees based upon really oblique movie references (The Goonies in this case). Its certainly a more novel way of going about making movie tees than just slapping a logo over the chest, and I would be willing to bet that it would get you a lot more respect from people in the street if they got the reference, and we’re all aware that knowing nods from strangers are amongst the best kinds of respect.

Its odd to see such an intricate design not placed in the middle of the shirt, its almost as if they’re trying to not draw attention to it, which is strange because it truly is quite an exquisite illustration. Rube Goldberg machines fascinate me, as I’m sure they do pretty much everyone else, there’s just something about the amount of time, effort, thought and imagination that goes into creating them that sucks me in, and whenever I’m watching videos of them, you’re constantly expecting something to go wrong, because the movements seem to be so on the edge, and yet they always work out fine, with seemingly effortless elegance. This design doesn’t quite capture that elegance, but it does have enough elements to be the makings of one hell of a Rube Goldberg machine!

I’m pretty sure that the stock tee is a standard American Apparel tee, except with a rather nifty looking custom Kindred tag sewn into the neckline, so you know about the quality level you’re getting in that regard (…good). Print quality feels impressive too, and the colouring really captures the subtlety of the pencil hand drawn style as well.

Costiness=$24.95 URL

Lots of expandable thumbnails of this tee so I’ve placed them behind a cut to keep things a bit tidier:
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So, I got an e-mail from Bountee (who also rock a * in their name) yesterday that said something along the lines of “you might be interested in this” and then there was a link to their blog. Cool, I thought, they’ve started a blog, I like seeing an insiders perspective on running a t-shirt company, but rather crucially I didn’t look at the blog, I can’t remember why, it might have been because I had to go and pick up my grandparents from the train station.

Anyway, if I had looked at their blog, I would have realised what they meant, a 50% off sale across the site! Luckily for us though, the sale has been extended through until Monday.

Just enter the code ‘bonitas‘ into the gift code box when you are at the checkout to receive the discount.

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Design By Humans kicked off their design competition in style with an opening prize of $5000. The winning tee from that particular competition is going to be announced on Monday (August 27th). Expect to see me post about it as soon as I see it. I know its not the biggest news ever, but this does mean that DBH are going to be starting their programme of daily competition winners (each of which get a $750 prize), which is pretty exciting stuff I’m sure you’ll agree!

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ABTs ‘Cheap Friday’ is a really cool promotion, every Thursday night I get an e-mail alerting me to what product from their inventory will be cheap on Friday, I guess they send out the e-mails on a Thursday because it means the recipient will find the price of the item to be… better tomorrow. Marketing geniuses!

This hoodie is pretty cool though, there’s no graphic, but it doesn’t need one, the devil is in the details in this case. There’s the thumb holes in the wrist cuffs, the unusual pattern stitching around the kangaroo (marsupial?) pocket, the slightly raised edges of the hood (better in winter I would bet) and the way that the whole thing is pattern lined (you’re probably going to need to click through to really appreciate it). I Probably wouldn’t want to wear the reverse as a hoodie, but I think that seeing smatterings of it on the gray side of the hoodie really brings a little spice to the mix.

Costiness=€39 URL

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Two, Oddica posts in a week? Yeah, but its hardly my fault since they release such great designs so consistently. Yeah, its a weird design, but, Oddica is the land of Odd, remember?

Costiness=$40 URL

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I really dig technical diagram tees like this, and I like the way that Slow Shirts have managed to make it look a lot more human than most technical drawings by using a hand drawn technique. I’m not going to claim that I understand the inner workings of a car engine, but I would presume that everything is labeled as it should be, which makes it all the cooler.

Click through to get some more detailed images.

Costiness=$24 URL

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