INVOKE Party with Tim Wu
Streetwear outfit INVOKE threw a party at Club DKD last weekend.
Minimal placements, kept it quite lo-key.
A few logo hits here and there, that's it.
Nicely done by Mr. Box
Our good buddy Tim Wu took the stage to perform for the crowd.
His new single sounds like a winner with the crowd.
INVOKE, another fresh collection to watch out for in the Mainland scene.
MC Tim Wu, he has enough fans to pack this place as it is.
Can't wait to see his upcoming album in summer.
CUT & PASTE Shanghai
CUT & PASTE Digital Design Tournament Shanghai took place this past Sat.
This was the first time the tournament came through China in its 5 years history.
I was asked to be on the judge panel for the 3D part of the competition, and I had no idea what to expect walking into it.
Each participant was given 15 mins to compose a 3D piece following one given theme. 15mins, to me, is not alot of time, and to do this LIVE in front of about 400 people, I can't even imagine the pressure the participants had to bare during the competition.
All 4 participants performed amazingly well. It was a pain to rate them with simply a 1-4 scale. But that was the deal, and ranked them we did. My attention didn't really went to the final piece, but more towards the work process each of these 4 designers had, their behavior. It was fun to watch. They all had 15mins to use, all shared the same theme/topic, it was up to them as to how they use that time wisely. One person spent about 3 mins to fidle with his iPod before he started work while the others jumped right in there. And still, he was able to finish his amazing rendering under that 15mins mark. He didn't win, but he ranked right up there, I can tell you that!
The event was well recieved.
Attendance was very good. I can see that many had a great time watching the competition unfolded. I take my hat off to the organizers (Panthea, Beck and the rest of the crew) and of course, the brain behind CUT & PASTE, John Fiorelli.
See you in Shanghai again soon.
(Photo credit: Kosuke Sato.)
G-Related
Last week, CASIO hosted a new product conference in Shanghai.
Of course, my first stop was the G-Shock booth above all else.
They showed a series of collaborations the watch giant did over the past 2 years.
And also announced that the G-Lide 5500 model will arrive the Mainland market within the next month or so. Very good news.
Within the CASIO family, there's a sub-brand named EDIFACE.
The story I got was that EDIFACE was originally made just for the Mainland market, but since it sold so well, this brand is now being brought to other Asia countries as well.
I actually like these models in the EDIFACE line, but frankly, at these prices, I might just go with NIXON.
Speaking of "G", how about a little sneak-peek on this beautiful Monday morning?
G-Robot, by Jukai, got down-sized!
These bad boys are 9cm tall, and comes in various designs by different collaborators.
These are in production right now, so, July? TTF?
Oliver Hibert / Revelator
Is Friday here, let's show you what we have been working on.
No dates, no nothing though.
Is a sample.
Designed by Oliver Hibert, here's a character we have been working on for a while now.
Without giving too much away, I'll just let the photo do the talking.
Hope you guys like it. 
The new goodies from REVELATOR has just arrived ICONIC-1 this morning.
I personally love this label and Wade's work, so it was without any hesitations that we ordered almost all the products in the catalog. The first wave for 2009 is looking fresh. I'm already looking forward to the next wave.
May 23rd seems like a Good Day
Seems like this Sat, May 23rd, is a good date on people's calendar.
A few things will happen as to my knowing, and I'm sure tons of other events will happen in various countries as well.
CUT & PASTE Digital Design Tournament will make its Shanghai stop at Shanghai Sculpture Space that nite. I'll be on the judge panel for the 3D competition.
And then, I'll be off to INVOKE's party at Club DKD.
INVOKE is relaunching its brand this season, and this is their first club event. I won't want to miss this.
Over in Taipei, our good friends from INVINCIBLE will open its second store in the city also on that day. This time, Shi-men District, the West Side. They are set out to be THE sneaker boutique in town, so you'd definitely want to check them out if you are in Taiwan.
NOKIA x W+K London x adFunture
NOKIA x W+K London x adFunture
A while back, W+K London cooked this up for NOKIA in the UK. The theme surrounded NOKIA's "Music Almighty" campaign, hence, the head phones and speakers. This collaboration was done on our YOKA platform. The Wieden+Kennedy London design team did the graphic design, adFunture produced. These weren't made available for public sale. 300 people out there got these.
CUT & PASTE Digital Design Tournament
CUT & PASTE Digital Design Tournament will make its Shanghai stop next week, May 23rd, at Shanghai Sculpture Space.
If you are in town, make sure you come check it out.
If you are in the 3D tournament, then eventually, you'll have to deal with me on that day! Good luck!
This should be fun.
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2 items arrived the studio this afternoon.
One was expected, the other one wasn't.
New products are about to be shipped out, these came in for photo shoot.
Could this be?
It might be.
The "Prince of Bel-Air" watch by PUMA?
I don't know. Whatever the name should be, it is a very nice watch.
Thank you very much for your kind thoughts, Erik.
Suzzy / SHOES MASTER / ARKIV GO!
Always enjoy catching up with Suzzy Tan.
He was a dominent part of PEN Crew and also one of our most treasured studio designers. Some of you might recongize his name from the BUKA Chinese Design Series. It has been almost 1 year since his departure from our studio, we sat down to review what he has learned and experience since then. Always an insightful thinker and observer, Suzzy discussed with me some of the problems he noticed in the current design community. Like I said; Insightful.
Glad to see you again, brother.
Can't wait to see you back on the streets bombing again.
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A while back, the editing team of SHOES MASTER Magazine from Japan paid Shanghai a visit. I had the pleasure of sitting with them and chatted about sneaker collecting in China in general. That trip, they were on a mission. It was the first time SHOES MASTER report about the scenes outside of Japan. On that trip, they visited Taipei, Shanghai and Hong Kong, in that order.
All the experience and learning from that very trip was made into content in this issue of SHOES MASTER Issue 11.
Thanks to the SM Crew for including me in the content, I'm sure I have the smallest collection within that group of cats. Glad to see ICONIC-1 was represented in the Shanghai section as well. Our small shop is definitely growing, hopefully we can do more at the shop, make more things happen in the city.
If you like sneakers, go grab a copy of this.
You'll like it.
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Something we've been working on, slated for Summer Release.
ARKIV GO!
Or, is it BROTTTTT! ?
Hope you dig.
New Balance x MITA Sneakers Series in Shanghai
Rushed back to Shanghai last Friday, mainly because I didn't want to miss the New Balance event KGPY worked on with ATP in Shanghai. I got off the plane, dropped my luggages at the studio, replied a few emails, and out again I went. Walked over to ATP which is very close to our studio.
The event was basically a show of all the collaborative MT series Japanese sneaker shop MITA Sneakers did with New Balance. All based on the MT580 model. From the first collab to the latest Series 15th were all on display inside ATP. It was not a huge exhibition or anything, afterall, each series only consisted of 2-3 pairs of shoes, but the point was more about letting more consumers know about how "cool" New Balance can be. In a market place that views NB as a traditional, conservative brand, this can do wonders.
Although the colors are way out of my reach in terms of wearability, I liked this pair the most out of the whole collection. Too bright for me though, this old man can't rock this no more.
HK Break
Went back to Hong Kong for a few days to be with my family last week.
Very simple, easy-going trip, which can pretty much sum-up in 3 words:
FOOD, SNEAKERS, FOOD.
Madl's Chibi Charm / Dita Von Teese
Got notice last nite that I'll have to go to Hong Kong tomorrow, so today was a crazy day filled with finishing up work before the trip. All future deadlines, all of a sudden, became "TODAY". The studio crew worked hard today, which really helped. Thanks guys.
As the Mini DCTOs (official name is Chibi Charms) by DACOSTA are close to being shipped out, I spent some time admiring the work of a good friend Jeremy Madl. Can't believe after all these years, we haven't worked on a project together, well, finally, this will be our first collaborative piece. Whenever I think of Jeremy, I think about the first MONKEY SHOW (circa 2003) we did back in da day with FLING. Jeremy was cool enough to help work on a piece for the show for me so many years ago. That piece, the melting Fling, is still one of my personal all-time favorite show piece throughout the tour. But anyways, that was a long time ago, and many custom toy exhibitions ago. Eddi is getting sentimental again.... tissue? who got tissue?
As the day winds down, I was at it with the Twitter thing again.
I always say to my friends "Darn! Jeff got over 4000 followers!"
Ashame to admit that I only have like 124 this minute. haha Nobody likes me.
But tonite, after nosing around Tara's page, I came across one Dita Von Teese.
I've seen her somewhere before, but I never knew she has such a strong fan base.
How many?
27,363.
I know I'm over reacting, but think about it though, anything you want to say, 27363 people will be reading it more or less at the same time. Twitter is becoming a powerful communication platform.
Cool Magazine from Taiwan
COOL Magazine in Taiwan had a 2-page spread on yours truly in their April issue.
The topic wasn't designer figures though, but sneakers.
I was asked about my love for sneakers and how I started collecting.
At the same time, I had the fun task of introducing PUMA Monster Pack to the Taiwanese readers.
Thanks to COOL Mag Crew for having me do this.
Is fun for me to talk about other things besides toys.
