Fashion, Uncategorized

Home
Fashion
Ain’t it a Treat!

Ain’t it a Treat! July 25, 2012Fashion, Uncategorized0 Comments

‘Ain’t it a treat’ rhymes with street and that’s what it means in Cockney.

Their clothes and accessories are for those who love urban style, who like to stand out in a crowd and are not afraid to be different.

Their garments are made only by young and independent designers and artists, so you can be sure that you will be wearing something unique and special.

So who are they?
A story of AIN’T IT A TREAT! shop

During one crazy night on a beach in Thailand, flowing with beer, two sisters decided that they were fed up with sitting behind desks and they wanted to create their own future.

‘Why don’t we sell something?’ said one.

Because it was an ambiguous question, the other one thought a bit about it and agreed that ‘selling something’ will be better than making a coffee for her boss for the rest of her life.

Few months later they found that ‘something’: beautiful hand made jewellery, edgy looking t-shirts and tights they had never seen before in their lives.
That’s how the AIN’T SHOP was created!

TLG wanted to catch up with the sisters, Joanna and Magdalena to find out their views on the current street wear market.

What appeals to you most about limited edition marketing?

Every woman has had a situation where they have bought something that they thought was special and unique, but then they went out and found that there were 3 other people wearing the same thing! With limited editions a situation like that won’t happen. When you wear it, you just know that there’s no piece thing like that in this world.

We also like the creativity behind creating such items. Imagine how much effort you need to put in the process so every single t-shirt or bracelet is different from the others. That’s how we discovered Alexandra from Odio tees. Her t-shirts are absolutely great. Every one of them is different from the other and you can’t have two exactly the same. She makes each of them individually.

Marlena Rakoczy makes her jewllery by hand and each piece is a work of art. It’s great to know that you’re wearing something that someone put so much work into.

Hold Me Tights are another brand that appealed to us. There are no other tights on the market like that. We’re very proud to have them onbaord.

And Arriba Wear has just inspired us to open up to something even more exciting.

We’re all about creativity and freedom of expression and these brands represent just that! It’s wonderful to know that we support someone so talented and who loves what they do!

How do you source the independent designers that you choose to work with?

We choose things we like and we know that different items would appeal to different people, so we always want to have a variety of things in stock. We also try to find out about the producer a little bit more. We want to know what materials they use and how they make their clothes. We want our designers to be passionate about what they do.

We also look at the designs and choose things that are colourful, different and have that little bit of edge to them. We definetly don’t want them to be boring and similar to what you have in the high street shops.

The designers and producers we work with are truly passionate about what they do and we always try to maintain the close relationship with them, so when there is an emergency and some young lady in the UK needs a different size or a colour of a particular item we currently don’t have in stock, we can always contact our designers who are more than happy to help.

Your new collection of T-shirts known as the Arriba line has been designed by top Polish graffiti artists. Which aspect of graffiti writing inspires you the most and what is it about this style of art which suits your brand?

We chose to cooperate with Arriba Wear because they’re young and fresh and they are absolutely passionate about what they do. The graffitti artists who designed the t-shirts are the most famous ones on the Polish graffitti scene, which is another great advantage.

We admire grafitti artists as actual artists, not (as some people would say) vandals. We love their commtiment and courage. Some things you can see, for example, on the East London’s walls are simply amazing. The graffitti scene in Poland is also getting stronger and stronger. Polish street artists are recognised at the top festivals around the world and, in this case, we also want to show their work and how awsome they are. Streetart is for people who think outside the box and want to change the world around them. This is what fascinates us and with the clothes and accessories on our website we want to give people the freedom of expression.

Is there a connection between your brand and the graffiti scene in Poland? If not, what made you approach SEPE, KOXU, Akuma 101 and Szyman SC?

We come from Poland, so the current situation on the Polish graffitti scene is very close to us. That’s why we’ve decided to work with Arriba Wear. Their connections and cooparation with Polish artists, mentioned in your question is a result of Arriba’s experience. The brand not only invites graffitti artists to collaborate with them, but also supports young dancers and sports men and women. Very often you can meet them on different events associated with street culture. After their first collection of t-shirts, Arriba decided to go one step further and invited artists to work with them. They wanted to turn the street into an art gallery and that’s how the Arriba on canvas was created. The whole idea was so cool and inspiring that we decided to promote their stuff on the UK market. We hope we can continue this and maybe organise some events in the UK together?

Why should people buy limited edition clothing, rather than shopping in high street stores?

Of course, you can have a limited edition item in a high street shop as well, but will you respect it as much? You will probably throw it away after wearing it a few times. When you buy from us you are sure that someone out there put a lot of effort to produce the thing you’re wearing. They actually made it by hand, just so you can enjoy it. It’s also something you won’t see anywhere else, so you’re likely to keep it for longer.

Do you have a shop as well as the online store?

We wish! This is our dream to have a shop and we hope to have one in the future.

Why do you think it is that most streetwear companies don’t produce a womenswear line?

When we say ‘streetwear’ we think of menswear straight away. It happens because the street art scene was, for many years, dominated by men. However, this has slowly started to change. Streetwear is no more a world of skateboards and hip-hop. You don’t need to lead an extreme way of life to love streetwear. Most brands don’t produce streetwear clothes for women because there are certain stereotypes which are hard to break. This means there is a new, unknown area out there, which awaits to be discovered and this excites us even more!

Do you notice a difference within your own label between the sales in your menswear line compared with your womenswear line?

Yes, a little bit, but our main focus are women and that’s maybe why. We have a few t-shirts for men from Arriba and from Odio and we’re planning to get some more. However, we think that in the UK women don’t have much choice when it comes to hand made clothes. Mostly they are very expensive and they are associated with big desinger lables. We want to prove that this doesn’t need to be the case. We want to show women that ‘limited edition’ and ‘hand made’ means good quality and affordable as well.

How do you ensure that your street wear lines appeal to the female market?

One of our friends has bought a t-shirt from us recently. She doesn’t know what streetwear is at all, but she liked the t-shirt because it was funky and colourful. Among the designers and companies we choose to work with, we go for those who make the clothes which many women could wear. And hey! we’re also women.

What are your plans for the future of Ain’t it a Treat!?

We have so many ideas! We defintely want to work with young people, maybe with fashion students who can bring something special to the fashion world.

Our shop is only a few months old and there are so many things we would like to do.

The next in our calendar is a trip to Poland in the next few weeks, where we hope to purchase a few exciting stuff. Our ultimate goal is to have our own small shop where young people could come and make their clothes.

http://aintshop.co.uk/