The tale of tees

Personal touch

Have you ever felt that sinking feeling in your stomach when you realised that you aren’t the only one in the room wearing the new T-shirt that you so eagerly paid your hands and legs for? In your hasty attempt to be ‘unique’, have you ever ended up purchasing something that you have later regretted because you share no emotional connect with it? 

While some consider a T-shirt to be nothing more than a piece of clothing to cover their upper half of their body, for others it has become a way to emote and express, and even protest.

 T-shirts are no longer something you just throw on. Nor can you just expect the person standing next to you to walk right past you and not notice the content on it. T-shirts make a statement, a commentary and reveal more about the wearer than necessary.

Bengaluru, which is the ‘Start-up Capital’, has, over the years, seen an increase in the number of companies who aim to provide their customers with meaningful, relatable and quality T-shirts.

Says Vibhu Pillai, founder of ‘Concept Nation’, “When I was in college, I met a guy who was wearing a Las Vegas T-shirt, and when I asked him where it was, he said Malaysia.

The next time I met him, he was wearing a T-shirt with the Italian flag on it and when I asked him about it, he said he liked the Italian football team. It made me wonder whether he had more of an emotional connect with that T-shirt...It is this emotional connect that we try to sell at ‘Concept Nation’.”

A customer gets the opportunity to get to know the artwork on their T-shirt, the artist and the story behind the artwork, and it is this feature that makes their clothing unique.
Vivek Pathak, from ‘Chulbul Store’, calls India the “hub for T-shirt makers”.

 “Before, you had T-shirts being sold on the streets and they had no way to travel from city to city. But now, with the rise of e-commerce, every city has become connected. There are so many niche brands popping up – for TV series, movies, comic heroes, books etc. Real fans won’t be looking at brands but rather the quality of the T-shirt.”

 ‘Chulbul Store’ is a haven for comic-lovers and couch potatoes with a witty sense of humour.  ‘Kool Sisya’ is a store that prints funny Kannada language T-shirts. Says Harsha, founder, “We make T-shirts that are funky and those you normally wouldn’t get on the rack. Everywhere you go, people are wearing something from an end-of-season sale or a new collection that has just come out, but they have no new characteristics.”

But Vibhu says not everyone takes this much interest in their clothing. “About 30 to 35 per cent of our customers are those who buy things because they think something is flashy. Most of our artists are professional designers, journalists and some engineers.”