T-Shirt Reviews Blog

Posted: 18 Nov 2009 04:34 PM PST

If you’ve read the recent review at Buy Tees featuring T-Post T-Shirt Magazine you’ll already know about their amazing concept and of course their highly innovative t-shirts. Well we’ve just had an offer from T-Post we couldn’t resist, they are letting us give away 3 x 3 month subscriptions to T-post.se for free, that means each of our winners will receive 3 free t-shirts, each worth €26 (including shipping) - all three prizes total a whopping great €234/$350 value!

If you want a chance to win a free 3 month subscription to the fabulous T-Post Magazine simply email us your answer to the following question:-

“T-post is celebrating an anniversary next release. Which one?”

Email your answer along with your name, address and size (Men and Women S to XL) to submissions@buy-tees.net (mark the subject as “T-Post Contest”). In ten days (29th November) we will randomly pick three winners and announce them here! So get cracking now and post us your answer. If you need a reminder of just how good T-Post’s tees are check these out!

Hurry this offer won’t last long - well 10 days actually.

P.S We know this isn’t a review but hey it’s our first proper giveaway so I am sure you can forgive us for making this fab news a featured post!

The Tee Tao of Hizoku

Posted: 18 Nov 2009 07:49 AM PST

Hizoku have lofty ideals, that’s for sure. Their aim to collectively cultivate human creativity is borne out in their high concept, intricately illustrated tees for the t-shirt connoisseur, there’s no doubting that. The supreme message might not be to everyone’s taste, such as the t-shirt blog Hide Your Arms, but it doesn’t take long to realise that once you’ve arrived at Hikozu’s store the results speak for themselves. I don’t really mind what the ultimate aim is for this brand, I just know good t-shirts when I see them, and this label supplies them thick and fast. With a superb team of professional artists and graphic designers working behind the scenes to advance the art of the t-shirt, rest assured Hizoku deliver what they promise.

Names such as Facundo Diaz a prestigious Argentinian graphic/web designer and 3D illustrator, Tony Ariawan an Indonesian designer and 3D illustrator with an incredible eye for light and all its manifest effects, and A. J Dimarucot whose elemental blending of the extremes of traditional art and graphic design all reside in this particular slice of higher consciousness known as Hizoku. For those with their feet firmly planted in the ground, the fact that Dimarucot is a former art director for OgilvyOne be a simpler clue to the extreme high standard of illustration at this beguilingly graphic t-shirt company. Here’s another even bigger sign that Hizoku are probably as hot as an indie t-shirt brand can get, Dimarucot is currently in the top ten designers at Design By Humans, if he’s voted the overall best he’ll be awarded a massive $10,000 - so if you do love his work go and vote for him here.

Hizoku have yet more strings to their proverbial bow, they’re business savvy to the extreme, with freebies pouring out left, right and centre, here’s what you can expect for being a customer at their store.

*Free shipping on all orders over $75 in the USA.
*Customer perks including: Buy 1 item and receive a free sticker pack. Buy 2 for free stickers and a wristband. Buy 3 items for free stickers, a wristband and free shipping. Buy 4 for all of the above plus a free randomly chosen t-shirt!
*Buy 5 shirts or posters for a 12% discount. Buy 10 for a 20% discount. Yep they print posters too at just $10 each!
*Join their Street Team and earn a free shirt for every 5 you sell.

Phew… let’s take a look at our top picks:-

Gnarled Gorilla Tee

This terrifying tee is Hizoku’s current best-selling shirt, very much in-your-face graphics sliding between graphic novel art and freehand vector style, the blood splattered beast is entitled the Gnarled Gorilla. The footnote for this t-shirt mentions it rushing out of the jungle to eat your face which is no exaggeration. I saw a documentary recently about a woman who’s face was ripped to shreds by a monkey, I don’t know why primates feel it necessary to target the face, but the results are far far more gory than this little number. You’ve been warned, if you do go native remember to take a hocke ymask, no better yet try a crash helmet, no even better, don’t go. Check out the amazing 360° view of the Gnarled Gorilla tee here. This amazing design by the amazing illustrator Chris Parks‘ is available in sizes M to XXL for $20 (add $1 for XXL size).

Everything Is Energy Tee

An amazing study in light, Tony Ariawan’s Everything Is Energy is a t-shirt design after my own heart. Not only is it visually stunning, it also carries a message that is as close to spirituality as I will most probably ever get. The fact is that matter, i.e we humans and everything we view as constituting life, never dies. Matter is merely energy slowed to a near stop, running at a vibration so meandering it’s almost unnoticeable. But the fact remains that without the production of energy, on an atomic level, the whole of the human race would fit into the size of a sugar cube. Energy makes up the unseen space that forms matter, we were it, we are it, we will return to it. Science has a funny habit of explaining the unexplainable far more adequately than any religion out there. So don’t worry you’ll never die although you probably won’t remember being alive. Lol. A mastery of colour and fluidity all contained within a single t-shirt, get the Everything is Energy tee in sizes S to XXL for $20 (add $1 for XXL size) here. 360º View.

The Soulseeker Tee

Love Chase Stone’s illustration but not keen on the ‘edge’, I know it’s not a clearly drawn out box, they’ve blurred it, but I really don’t like rectangle prints. Either cut out shapes from the landscape and let the t-shirt colour bleed through, which helps if you choose a matching t-shirt colour in the first place, or print all-over. It’s a shame, it’s a crazy looking image, it just needs to be framed a little better. Get The Soulseeker tee in sizes S to XXL for $20 (add $1 for XXL size) here.

Dream Cosmic Tee

One more tee before I split, this is Dream Cosmic by Joe Jesus, a rather beautiful t-shirt which looks as amazing (if not more) as a poster. Again there’s that border, I know there are plenty of you that won’t mind it, but I think this illustration would be so much more suited as an all-over print. Still, nit picking asides it’s a gorgeous tee, opening up a sense of perspective and scale that puts everything colloquial and human in its place. Our subconscious, individual and collective works on a far greater scale than logic can curtail. We are tiny people on a tiny planet lost in the outer suburbs of the least exciting area of The Milky Way. Roll on light speed travel, all we need to do is learn how to envelope space, harness free energy and live forever. Any ideas? Get this star tee in sizes S to XXL for $20 (add $1 for XXL size) here or check out the 360º view here.

Check out the rest of Hizoku.com and their high art t-shirt packed store at ShopHizoku.com

Fancy submitting your own ideas or designs? Contact Hizoku for more details send art here and concepts here.

Lifestyle World

Wednesday, 18 November 2009