Threadless.com - Get Your Illustration on a Tee
Attention illustrators and designers - if you need to promote yourself and your illustration skills (and make a few extra dollars as well), why not give Threadless a try? What is Threadless? Threadless was created by a couple of guys called “the Jakes” under their DBA Skinny Corp. to give designers and artists an opportunity to unleash a little creativity and display it to the masses. Anyone can visit the site, download their templates and submit a t-shirt design. Then, the designs are voted on. The winning designers receive $2,000 in cash and prizes, huge amounts of notoriety and their design printed and sold on a tee.
Since they launched the site, Skinny Corp has received over 60,000 tee shirt design submissions. It’s been a great way for designers and illustrators to get their name out there. Over 300 winning designs have been printed and sold so far, with 6 new ones coming out every week.
The site features interviews with some of their designers, some who’ve won only a few times, while one guy from Louisianna has won over 13 times. (That’s a hefty chunk of cash and prizes) Plus, it worked into a job for this particular guy - and now he works at Threadless.
One of their winners, S. Bradley Askew when asked if he thinks Threadless helps designers:
Honestly, its one of the best things in the design community right now. Some of publicity T receives helps catapult designers who get featured in magazines like ‘GQ.’ PR like that is great and to tell clients you had work featured in publications like that, that wasn’t some sort of paid advertisement, it’s golden.
So if you’ve ever had a good idea for a t-shirt design - design it, enter it. There could be some recognition as well as a little cash in your future. (Heck, I’ll give it a try and post my design - wish me luck!)