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02/03/2008: "Puma & Random Thoughts"

Puma Mid, low key comfort. I have been enjoying this pair of soles this past week. A slight change of pace from my usual lineup of kicks.

Officially the last night of work tomorrow, I doubt we'll get anything done tomorrow, but what da hell, let's try to get as much done as possible. After tomorrow, I'm gone. A full week of family gathering non-sense we call "New Year" holidays... Me? I just wanna get outta here for a week. No plastic samples, no paint job tests, no nothing.

Once we come back from the holidays, we'll be offering the much awaited TLP 10" Teddy Troops via our website. Shipping has been an issue with us recently, so we'll be shipping out all TT Pacs at one go after the holidays, customers who have placed their orders, pls hang tight for a while longer, your troops will be with you soon.

I've been reading through a few message boards, and some folks are already talking about our new TT release, which was designed by pop art icon Frank Kozik. There are always mixed opinion about Frank's work. I won't want to get into all that. I don't think it is fair to pass judgments on one's design when the designer doesn't really have a need to explain to the world why he did a certain piece. The old saying goes "if you don't dig it, just don't get it". This has always been true towards adFunture products. We never go blow a million bucks on advertising or to make mega cross promotions just to get more eyeballs on our goods. We are a tight outfit, where we are catering to a niche group of collectors and fans. We decide our production run according to our own judgment of how many people we are catering to on each item. We only work with artists/designers where we believe in, believe in "what" can be for various reasons. "sales", "meaning", etc.

We reached out to Fortress way back in 2003. There was never a toy done by him at that time, he wasn't big in Hong Kong back then neither. I saw his works, and was deeply attracted, so I got in touch with him, and decided to make the Teddy Troops into a figure series. No real research was done on how popular he was or will be. It was a gut feeling. This is the same way we have been choosing which artists to work with from day one. Of course, today, the world of vinyl is way more complicated, but we still want to stick with this method, this "gut feel" decision making method. I'm proud to say that we didn't "miss" too many times in the past 6 years. Fortress being one of our best decisions ever. I thank him for his help throughout these years.

Frank. While some would question his creativity when it comes to skin designs, I think we should look at this whole thing from a grander view. CAN this guy design? Look at all of his works as a whole, and I think you'd have a positive answer. I myself do not question if he can design, because I saw the evidents pointing to a big "hell yeah". Why does he repeatingly uses the same designs when it comes to figures? Not so true. He has designed a lot of toys using different designs. He does, however, uses similar looking designs for various "platform toys". What some of them do share was a common theme. Anarchy, smoking, communisim, etc. I personally look at them as themes.

Kozik's "Anarchy" can be looked at as a themed collection. The collection is trying to get spreaded onto as many places or platforms as possible. Although Kozik is not a graffiti artist, one can say that he's "bombing" with the Anarchy theme. Sticking it anywhere possible, everything if possible.

Besides Kozik himself, this whole Anarachy collection will go down in art design history as an icon on its own.

Doesn't Obey uses his Giant face the same way? Is he innovative?

I think if you compare the two artists' body of work, you will see that Frank might be the better man.

Kaws with his cross-eyes? Alot of peeps were screaming bordem. However, characters by Kaws without the cross-eyes might be dismissed, because people can't immediately relate those characters to Kaws. People do need some symbols or common themes to relate to some artists' works. I don't want to get into a Kaws discussion, because I don't want people to read me the wrong way. But I would like to say that I personnally like his latest figure Hasheem. Some folks, again, have a different opinion about the Hasheem make-over, but I think that character conversion was done very nicely. Imagine, IF YOU WERE asked to do the conversation with your usual style, how far can YOU take Hasheem? And what if this new Hasheem by Kaws doesn't have the cross-eye, would YOU buy it?

Truth of the matter is, a Kaws toy without the cross-eye has never been proven to be able of being sold out in under 10mins.

Anyways, I'm sidetracking.

Back to the Kozik TT. We made it for the people who do enjoy the Anarachy Series and Teddy Troops Series. And believe it or not, there are alot of people out there who likes the Anarachy mission.

Well, at least, I believe it.

This is not a start of the Teddy Troops Series going "mainstream", although we are working with a few artists that are more active in the vinyl scene. Is not a bad thing, and it certainly is not the wrong thing to do. Will Teddy Troop become a fad in 8 months?

We don't know. We do know, however, Teddy Troops will be growing very visibly in 2008. It is time. It is its time.

Troops, are you ready for the ride?