Moondoggy

May 30, 2008 @ 3:53pm

element shirt.jpg Natalie and I are both kind of wondering what's up with the influx of moonlit animal tees.

Maison Martin Margiela's $1,395 tee recently made headlines for knocking off a David Penfound painting. But now we're seeing more of these tees hitting the pages of NYLONguys, like this one from Element.

You normally see shirts like these sold in souvenir shops, or on the backs of ATV riders about to head out hunting for the day.

So what's the deal? How did this look make it onto everybody's radar? Maybe we missed something, but we don't really see the appeal in wearing a t-shirt with a moose on it.

--KYLE HAYES

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:04PM

I agree
I find these tops horrible
YUCK

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:07PM

who would pay that much for it when you could buy one for $24.95 from The Nature Company?

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:09PM

too hickish for me!

posted by my fall collection

May 30, 2008 4:12PM

Funny --about a year ago my bf and I started thinking that moonlit animal tees were silly-cool. Hipsters had a monopoly on ironic cheap-things, so whenever we found a hipster blindspot such as the cheap ironic moonlit tees (<$30 on Steinway in Astoria), we try to get in on it before the hipster drones catch on.

Then coincidentally, the awesome Agathe of Style Bytes blogged about how she was fascinated with moonlit wolf tees, and she got one too.

And now today we have reached "influx" status.

To attempt to answer your question regarding their appeal: I like these t-shirts because they are an artifact of the macho ATV rider with a heart of earnest gold stereotype. And when we wear 'em, we both celebrate the stereotype and gently make fun of it as the same time.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:17PM

Ugh, i would love to know who decides things like this are fashion. We're taught for years specifically that things like this are NOT fashion, then one day they are? Sometimes I think people with influence just like to see who will wear something ridiculous. Anything that could be a potential faded tattoo on one of Anna Nicole Smith's relatives...should not grace the runway.

posted by ModestoT

May 30, 2008 4:27PM

i have a shirt just like this in the back of my closet. i am so ahead in fashion it scares me, ahha.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:33PM

uh flight of the conchords
duh

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:37PM

I think Santino Rice got people thinking about them when he wore his cheezy tees on PR. I think his had a lion on it all the time though?

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:43PM

Flight of the Concords.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:48PM

brett from flight of the conchords on hbo always rocked these tees. it's so bad, it might be good.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:49PM

Sorry, dudes, I think you missed this one. Hipster kids all over the place have been picking these up in thrift shops and road trips for the past five years. Sweatshirts and t-shirts sporting wolves and animals backlit by the moon are nowhere near new and I would argue the whole horse thing a couple years back came out of this same style of shirt with horses on the front.

posted by marc lover

May 30, 2008 4:52PM

does anyone know what has happened to Agathe of Style Bytes? She hasn't updated her blog for like a month, and she used to update almost daily. it's strange...

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 4:58PM

There's this ultra hipster boy where I go to school and he's been wearing a shirt like this for quite a while. It's so funny that it's happening all over, I totally thoguht it was just him being 'ironic' and 'original'. Those shirts are gross, though. they make me think of those cars with fake-wood panneling on the outsides.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 7:18PM

i thrifted a black sweatshirt with a back-(moon)lit bear on it right before I took a road trip to Montana with my very outdoorsy sister (i'm the non-outdoorsy, fashion-y sister, natch). it was (is) hideous. she totally got it, though and thought it was hilarious that i wore it. of course, the whole thing went to an entirely different level of fabulousness when we saw a middle-aged guy in a Cracker Barrel in Backwoods, South Dakota, wearing the very same sweatshirt with not a shred of irony.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 7:48PM

classic hipster shirt.
if anyone wants one, go to any canadian souvenir shop... the selection will astonish you.

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 8:27PM

uggg gross...and guest 4:49 if "Hipster kids all over the place have been picking these up in thrift shops and road trips for the past five years" I think five years is too much time for a trend...just saying, anyways I hate all these statement shirts as much as I hate logos

posted by guest

May 30, 2008 9:38PM

this style of wearing this..starting as far as i remember in the fall 2000 collection..balenciaga did prints like this in a old tapestry type of way with all type of animals.. as well as a big sweater with a doberman on it..and since then its been a underground tongue in cheek style statement

posted by rocketcup

May 30, 2008 10:12PM

i saw one in the summer urban outfitters catalog last week. i doubt the hipsters will be wearing them much longer now.

posted by Miriam

May 31, 2008 12:22AM

Stylebytes started looking for these a year ago. I didn't think it could work and then she made it work. I do wonder where the heck Agathe's gone.

posted by guest

May 31, 2008 2:00PM

I think if youre an avid animal lover, why not?!

posted by guest

May 31, 2008 5:21PM

It is probably a combination of Flight of the Concords and a growing "lets be green and shit" movement. I think they are quirky and as such work as fashion.

posted by emilyebba

May 31, 2008 5:55PM

3oh!3 used to wear them a lot. like in 2006.

posted by guest

Jun 01, 2008 1:34AM

I think you all just got fashion-punk'd by my home state- Wisconsin. Seriously. These have always been cool for two demographics: up-north tourists and kids under ten. People have been wearing them since the seventies at least, without pause. Just because the fashion world has temporarily (permanently?) lost its collective mind does not make these fugly t-shirts cool.

posted by guest

Jun 01, 2008 2:35PM

helllllooooooo

Have a little reverence to nature.

I sport that gear proud.

posted by guest

Jun 01, 2008 4:35PM

they're "ironic" i suppose. santino rice used to wear them on project runway except i think his had a tiger on it.

posted by guest

Jun 01, 2008 6:41PM

I second that they have been around- or "hip" for years. It's ironic.

So bad it's cool kinda thing.

The sneaker communities been mocking this for a while now. I like them - in that Napolean Dynamite kinda way.

posted by guest

Jun 02, 2008 12:02AM

Flight of the Conchords!!!

posted by guest

Jun 02, 2008 2:18AM

I AM AMUSED AT HOW CLOSE MINDED YOU ALL ARE ABOUT FASHION...

posted by kenya

Jun 02, 2008 12:03PM

omm, some of us love animal shirts. some shirts arent about being fashionable or making a statement even though the shirt may do both. sometimes the shirt is just about representing what you like. i like animals and i have the bear, woodchuck, and cow shirts to prove it. of course ive paid under $20 for each of those so i get the point. the luxury market is getting really crowded folks.

posted by guest

Jun 03, 2008 1:26PM

FYI- Element Skateboards x "The Mountain"

Unlike Maison Martin Margiela's T-Shirt (read: Direct Knock-Off), the Element T-Shirt is from a Collaboration with "The Mountain"....

Element did it right, and it still only costs 20 Bucks!?

http://www.themountain.com/html/shared/element.html