I first saw ‘i love boxie’ T-shirts in the Sunday Times Style Magazine in what I think was 2009, as ‘one to watch’. It’s safe to say I have; every so often, I log on to iloveboxie.com and check out the latest stories that have made their way onto T-shirts. I’m not entirely sure why I haven’t yet bought one; perhaps it’s because I feel I have nothing to say that belongs on a T-shirt and since the concept behind the shirts is stated clearly on the website “has something happened to you that needs to be on a T-shirt? You will know when that is” – as of yet…I’m not sure it has.
Anyway, their story goes that “one September, years ago, a T-shirt maker went missing in Los Angeles. It was said that some time after, rumours began to circulate that his last word had been ‘Boxie’.”
They claim that their T-shirts are the story of getting there, to Boxie, where there are no directions and it does not appear on any map; therefore they turn the stories they hear into T-shirts – a process they call T Spoke.
Their T-shirts are “made on the Shamble, a shamble meaning a type of journey a person undertakes when they really have no idea where they are going. A ‘shambler’ can be understood as this free spirited person.”
The idea goes that they are the anti-mass produced slogan T-shirt, they are imperfect and each one will be different with incomplete messages. I guess if you can relate to the message on the T-shirt, who cares whether it was your story – it could be.
T-shirts are available to buy in: women’s lowneck (£30), women’s oversized, women’s oversized vest (both £39), men’s classic (£30), men’s oversized and men’s oversized vest (both £39). They are available in white ink on white, black ink on white, shiny black ink on black and white ink on black.
Top Right: The only T-shirt that is always available to buy on iloveboxie.com, so many T Spokes they receive relate to this story. It is THE shirt.
Left: An example of one of the T-shirts currently available to buy in the ‘NOW’ section.