Given the current craze for multiple brands on a garment by illegal means with almost as much gusto as the bootleg boom of the late 1980s and the strange period when Boss, Nike and adidas shared shirt space with a neon rainbow fade connecting rival or disparate logos. This shirt from Oshman’s celebrates their extended family of outdoor brands (with an appropriately bouncy typeface) but omits Patagonia and Arc’teryx from proceedings despite their key positions in the Harajuku store. That’s a whole lot of big names in one place on the back of this t-shirt and while Merrell might have kicked back and become a laceless dad shoe of choice without any semblance of Free & Easy’s rugged paternal style, those with a longer memory might recall Merrell having some staggeringly expensive, Italian-made hikers like the Wilderness on the market back in the very early 1990s that rivalled Vasque. They definitely managed to kill that credibility on these shores, but in Japan they seem to be in good company. This brand orgy is excellent.
Paul Gorman is one of my favourite writers and while I wait for his books on The Face and artist Derek Boshier (check out this Clash artwork) I read a brief stopgap in the new GQ with Gorman’s feature on British photographer and fashion editor of Paul Raymond’s Club International, David Parkinson. It’s an education if you want to find out more about a forgotten legend who did a lot of things worshipped now several decades earlier, but took his own life before he could capitalise on it. On the subject of British subcultures rarely explored, the Dean Chalkley and Harris Elliott curated Return of the Rude Boy exhibition looks like it’s going to be a necessary visit when it opens in mid-June and this Guardian piece offers a quick overview of the look’s origins. It looks like Barrie Sharpe’s book has been successfully kickstarted too, meaning the Duffer story — and a lot of London’s clubland moments from a pivotal time — will be told.
I worked on a little project — Genealogy of Innovation that includes around 200 shoes — for the Nike Football Phenomenal House project that opens in London tomorrow at the Sorting Office on New Oxford Street. Lots of football boots from the past and a few other important shoes (with a few underrated gems in the mix) and it’s on until Saturday. There might be some more discussion regarding that exhibition on this blog next week at some point.
GWARIZM 
