moving forward

Woot!

As I write, Graham is placing our first odd guy art merchandise order: ball caps. After deciding to go with “Anvil” pigment-dyed caps, we chose three colors on which to have our logo embroidered. We’ve spent a lot of time researching blank hats and shirts and decided that the pigment-dyed garments are best suited for our demographic. They look slightly faded and worn, but are of excellent quality and softness (just like us!).

We’re trying to do this in a a sensible order. We can’t, for instance, design the website without first photographing the merchandise, but we can’t photograph the merchandise without first having it printed. And of course we can’t print the merchandise until it’s designed, but we can’t design the merchandise without first understanding our demographic. (And we can’t understand our demographic without first drinking a lot of coffee).

So we’ve spent the past several months doing research. Some of this simply included observing people while they hung out in coffee shops or wandered through art exhibits. But we’ve also been pouring through current marketing books and online forums and garment catalogs. We’ve surveyed our friends and harassed our families. And now, today, all of those months of pondering and studying have evolved into something tangible – and hopefully into something that YOU will find fun to wear!

Excitedly,

Marie

Advertisement

speaking of design ideas

So the sun is blazing across the studio floor (wow: dust) and we are immersed in that curious limbo; the setting up of a new business. We have our business name, we are proudly “odd guy art LLC,” but there are still many T’s to cross and I’s to dot. We have a growing number of T-shirt design ideas strewn randomly about our brains, the computer, and our bench. We have the beginnings of our quirky web site, yet nothing to wear.

We also, of course, have this blog, which we hope you will enjoy and come to love as one of your distant relatives. So stick with us, if you will, for news on how this adventure unfolds. Our web site will come alive in a month or two, when we officially open our doors and welcome you across our virtual threshhold.

We would like to tell you a little more. The odd guy art T-shirt designs will fall into two styles; our initial survey suggests both are equally popular.  Both styles will develop and grow as we proceed. Hopefully you’ll like what you see.

Our “simply art” style features crisp graphics to satisfy your appreciation for the odd and quirky – or just a good cup of coffee. We’ll combine attractive, thoughtful images with a quality, garment-washed shirt which you can be proud to wear anytime, anywhere.

Our “unlikely events” collection will feature humorous designs depicting mock amateur sporting events. Runs, swims, bicycle races – both contemporary and historical (even hysterical) – are all fair game. These will also be screen printed on soft, quality, garment-washed T-shirts.

We found some great garment-washed ball caps, too, which will be emblazoned with our own “odd guy art” logo. They will have your head covered.

For us at odd guy art, it’s about quality. Our T-shirts will not only look good, but they will feel good, too. Our colour palette will be natural and earthy. We seriously hope that you will like what we do.

Graham

Marie here…

While I was raised in the U.S., Graham grew up in the U.K., so you’ll notice that he spells things with extra U’s. This cannot be helped. You’ll eventually see the humour. (See?).

I’m very excited to start this new enterprise; it feels like a lifetime of experiences and interests are combining into something delightfully fruitful. I’ve always loved clever humor, like that of Steve Martin, Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart, Dave Barry, David Sedaris, Ellen DeGeneres, Garrison Keillor, and Demetri Martin, among many others. I grew up watching SNL and reading The Onion. I own every Bloom County book ever published. So to integrate these witty influences with 25 years of art and design experience seems a natural fit.

Our line of fun and artful T-shirts will debut in early spring. They will feature thoughtful, witty, and quirky designs of our own creation. Please stop in again when you have time.

Cheers,

Marie

art to a tee…

There was a day not so long ago when odd guy art didn’t exist and the world was a slightly duller place. But cheer up because that day has passed. Odd guy art is a collaboration of two artists from wildly similar yet wildly different backgrounds. I am Graham and that’s Marie over there trying to fix the broken water cooler; she’s very handy like that. So together, in this unlikely studio, we create art, play music, beat drums, drink warm water and hatch ideas to take over the world.

Odd guy art is our greatest plan yet, and it is turning remarkably serious. You need more T-shirts, you really do, believe us, we tell the truth. T-shirts with great images, of course, and a certain style. T-shirts that will make you smile. T-shirts with a different slant on our other passion: Keeping fit and living healthy. Not such a bad way to take over the world, right? That is the odd guy art plan in a nutshell; oh, plus some cool ball caps and maybe even attractive (imagine that) re-useable canvas shopping bags.

There is lots to do, though, so in the meantime we will say hi and welcome. We will both post here via the steam-driven laptop (it makes good tea) to share our progress and chat about our art and stuff. Head on back when you have a minute to see what we and odd guy art are up to.

All the best,
Graham

All content and images;
Copyright © 2010 by Hetzel and McAllister. All rights reserved.