I love clothing brands that are inspired by literature — admittedly, I don’t read too much of the stuff myself, but that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate the classiness it brings to a t-shirt. UK brand the-affair does just that, except it does away entirely with blatant references to themes and characters in the novels, and goes for the abstract/surreal art approach. The result is a collection of absolutely gorgeous, limited edition tees, presented in a rocking website which lets you view the shirt on a model with an interactive 360 degree view. Wow!
Here’s the lowdown on the brand from Zoltan Csaki, one of the owners, himself:
My favorite of the-affair’s shirts is “Mind Killer“, which is inspired by Frank Herbert’s classic Dune. More specifically, it’s based on a quote from the book reading “”I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer.” The design itself is extraordinarily beautiful — it’s well composed and touches on its classic lit origins with the weathered, black and white images. The imagery and symbolism is great too, showing that the designer put a lot of thought into its creation. The spider, presumably, represents fear, with the highlighted closed eye representing the speaker’s will to overcome his/her fear. It’s powerful stuff, and looks great on a shirt to boot.
the-affair flaunts their snappy typography skills with “Strange Aeons“, a shirt based off of H.P. Lovecraft’s infamous The Call of Cthulu. This design isn’t as abstract as the Dune one, but it still conveys the weirdness and griminess of Lovecraft’s creation even against a bright white shirt. The type is really beautifully arranged here, and the grunge pattern is fitting. I like how the texture of an octopus’ tentacles (can’t have Cthulu without the tentacles) was subtly incorporated into the background, offering a visual tie to the book this shirt was inspired by. Unfortunately, mostly sold out, with only scarce quantities of M and L remaining.
“Frenemies” is another gorgeous number, also sadly available in low number. This time the inspiration isn’t from a book published within the past century — it’s from Niccolo Machiavelli of the Italian Renaissance! Out of all the shirts I’ve featured, this design is the most abstract — it’s rather difficult to figure out how it connects to the quote (“Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer”), and to be honest I’m not sure I’ve got it untangled myself. Either way, this is an incredible piece of abstract/minimalist art, and the color scheme is great too. Few designs make me actually okay with wearing bright turquoise tees.
Coupon: TEEJ10 for 10% off, expires Christmas 2010
Store: the-affair
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