Are graphic tees DEAD??
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“Graphic-tee fatigue” … it’s a debilitating condition that those of us in the dope-under-the-radar-joints community know all too well (and which I discussed a bit when I interviewed graphic-tee virtuoso Sonya Sombreuil of Come Tees) …
Don’t get it twisted — some of my most-beloved possessions are graphic tees, whether it’s the RARE 1993 Rage Against the Machine longsleeve with murky CIA origins that I wrote about last summer; my ©1993 officially licensed Seinfeld tee (what is up with me and ‘93??); or the SICK “Blackbird SpyBlue” Björk MoMA bootleg that And After That / Edgar Gonzelaz recently made exclusively for Blackbird Spyplane’s “beautiful & blessed” Cla$$ified subscribers, donating 100% of the profits to undocumented people…
But for every 1 of these prized gems, I own approx. 3 inferior tees that I smashed the cop button upon in an ephemeral & deluded state of excitement… and that now clog up my damn closet depressingly !
Few garments can rival the quick-hit jawn-dopamine-delivery that popping graphic-tees provide … but the sheer glut of them can build up to a nasty hangover, where u wake up one day with a throbbing brain full of nagging questions, such as:
-“Is this tee a lifelong treasure that speaks to some unique set of interests and/or personal idiosyncrasies of mine — or is it a fleeting novelty that made me chuckle when I saw it on the TL, where I should have left it, uncopped?”
-“Will this graphic feel dated / make me look like a swaggerless trend-hopper in 2 weeks?”
- “How many kilotons of cotton-farming water, and how many hours of underpaid labor were involved in bringing this tee into my life, and in what sense were those costs remotely ‘worth’ the ~47 likes I hope to get when I post this baby ??’”
This is part of the reason we love designers like Small Talk, whose hand-drawn pieces are, by definition, small-run and super-personal — call ‘em “SLOW JAWNS.” (🚨 BTW: Small Talk’s releasing a limited-edition screen-printed tee later this month, and our Cla$$ified Subscribers will enjoy an EXCLUSIVE presale…🚨)