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Slogan t-shirts: getting it off your chest/on your chest

— by Alyson Walsh

The FMLY Store’s Selfish Mother t-shirts

My policy on wearing logo T-shirts has been reviewed. With everything that’s going on in the world right now, no one is beyond a spot of sloganeering. Just ask the first female artistic director at Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri, who grabbed the headlines when she sent “We Should All Be Feminists” T-shirts down the spring/summer 2017 runway. Based on the book of the Ted Talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the Instagram-friendly, limited edition garment soon developed a celebrity following and a waiting list.

I’ve written a feature on getting it off your chest/on your chest for the FT, including the popular slogan T-shirt and sweatshirt e-shop The FMLY Store (who have recently opened a bricks and mortar shop in Bruton, Somerset). Making a statement while giving something back is the ethos of the brand  – and as of February this year its “Good Tees” had raised around £515,500 for charity. Launched to coincide with International Women’s Day, the first run of the organic cotton “We Are All Wonder Women” sweatshirt (above, £50) sold out within a week, with £10 from each sale going to the charity Mothers2Mothers, which supports mothers and babies with HIV.

Bella Freud’s slogan sweaters and t-shirts (available HERE), worn by the likes of Kate Moss, Alexa Chung and your truly, have become cult classics and are permanently trending on Instagram.

And while getting it off your chest/on your chest is not a completely new phenomenon – those of us who were around in the ’70s will remember Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren’s punk T-shirts; and British designer Katharine Hamnett wearing a “58% Don’t Want Pershing” (a reference to US missiles being based in the UK) slogan tee when she went to meet Margaret Thatcher at Downing Street in 1984. But today’s social media buzz means that attention-grabbing visuals and memorable mantras quickly go viral, as Molly Gunn of The FMLY Store attests: “We ask our customers to ‘wear and share’ on social media, and this sharing ethos has not only spread the word but helped our brand grow. Instagram and Facebook are amazing, free ways for us to connect with our audience every day.”

Read the full FT feature HERE.

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My policy on wearing logo T-shirts has been reviewed. With everything that’s going on in the world right now, no one is beyond a spot of sloganeering.