The Robin and The Revolver

NAME: Fabrice
LOCATION: Cole's, Logan Square

This t-shirt is actually something that I found at a Buffalo Exchange and I picked it up because I had to do a poetry reading and I wanted something interesting and it had a multi-colored robin, and it looks decent. But I feel like the gun is so like large and almost imposing.

It's kind of a threat to the bird.

Yes. But at the same time, like, maybe the bird is not really threatened at all and so it implies a sense of coolness.

The bird is so cool, the bird's not even afraid of the gun.

I would think so actually. I think there's something pretty about it.


So for you, the t-shirt is about the bird, not the gun.

Oh, definitely about the bird, yeah.

But people notice that gun.

I think that people do, yeah. I didn't pick it out - I wasn't like, "Oh, look at that awesome gun." I literally was like, "Wow, that's a great like robin-ish looking bird that's multi-colored, followed by a gun."

Do you have any specific affinity for robins?

Um, the person that I am dating currently is really into those types of birds, so I guess when I saw it immediately I thought at first maybe she would like it. It's kind of weird, but yeah, that's what I thought.

And does she like it?

Yeah, she loved it.

I [steve frost] SF

NAME: Amy
LOCATION: Chipotle, Belmont & Kenmore

My shirt, which says "I [heart] SF" was made at the going away party for my friend Steve Frost - you can see his face in the heart - Steve is an artist who lived in DC and he just moved to Chicago in ... August? Sometime in the summer. To start art school. So he lives here now. Um, and at the party, this DC artist who makes t-shirts had everyone at the party silkscreen the design onto the t-shirts.

Did people silkscreen them themselves?

Um, well, the artist who does it had, like, you know, had the design and we just - I did my own. Like, I picked my t-shirt color and I picked the color - because it was a red ink and I knew that the red color would come out kind of purply and pretty. So I picked it for that but there were all different colors.

And this was done at the party?

This was done at the party.

That's cool.

Yeah.

So "SF" stands for "Steve Frost".

Yes.

And it's a picture of Steve Frost.

Yes.

So the shirt says: "I [steve] Steve Frost".

More or less.

That doesn't really make any sense.

But it's cute, isn't it?

The Ed Hardy Mermaid

NAME: Sarah
LOCATION: Parrots Bar and Grill, Wellington & Halstead

Ed Hardy is some kind of fancy t-shirt designer.

I suppose so. I guess that's what I've been told.

Where did you get this shirt?

Dude, I got it at Macy's, on sale.

Was it expensive?

It was supposed to be like ninety bucks, but I had all these coupons from Christmas time, so I think I paid like forty for it.

Do you have a lot of forty-dollar t-shirts?

No. The reason I love this one though is I love mermaids and it has a mermaid on it and she's got the devil hand up and that's awesome, so.


So for you it's all about the mermaid, not the Ed Hardy.

Yeah.

Do you get conflicted when people know that this is a hundred-dollar t-shirt?

Well some people might know that but I don't really care. Some guy tonight when I first came in was like, "Oh, Ed Hardy is a famous tattoo artist and I drank with him in North Carolina. I got hammered with him. He drinks Jack." And I was like, "Sure thing, dude." I didn't believe him. He also said he walked here from Fort Lauderdale. I asked him, "How did you walk here? What roads did you take?" And he's like, "I walked on foot." I'm like, "Well duh, I understand that you walked on foot, but did you walk along the highway? Where did you walk?" He's like, "Huh?" So this is the kind of asshole that asks me about my shirt. These kind of fucking idiots. That's my life behind the bar.