high-quality graphic tees

Calica

I used to get a lot of shirts from woot.com, but their quality dropped precipitously, to the point where shirts I bought from them 7 years ago are holding up better than shirts purchased much more recently. Most of my shirts are showing wear, though. Graphic tees with no visible branding are a staple of my casual wardrobe, but Google isn't much help for finding companies that sell quality shirts as opposed to emphasizing their art selection. Does anyone have a favorite company for this kind of thing?

I do need a women's cut, and I need it to not be made of tissue paper. Square-shaped "unisex" shirts don't fit me at all.

Burtletoy

I have a half dozen tees by Design By Humans that are also a dozen years old that are still in fine shape. Likewise with Full Bleed.

Pretty sure they are both just American Apparel shirts that they print on, though.

Iruka

Threadless has a wide variety of cuts and styles, their tanks are a bit thin, but most of their shirts hold. Catch them during a semi annual sale, so the shirts are 10 bucks. They are kinda hit or miss with the printing, so for sure wait till the prices are slashed.

I find they print some of their designs kinda tiny, and you can't tell till you get the shirt, really.

If you are in a cool town, I would see if there's any screen printing shops about, they often have some artsy stuff to sell. You'll pay 30 bucks for a shirt, but if it's done right it'll last a while.

Enc

Seconding Designs by Humans. A third of my tees are from them now and growing.

So far both Mrs. Enc and I have a bunch, from tees to sweaters and tanks, and so far all have both held their graphics well and worn well. We live in Florida so having the shirt not be paper is important with the regular sweating that happens.

KetBra

I like redbubble's shirt quality, and they have a variety of fits

Calica

Awesome; will check out Design By Humans. Thanks!

Local H Jay

Man I really don't need anymore T shirts but then I went to Design By Human and they have these really awesome Marvel shirts with like, a floral print?? These are incredible
https://www.designbyhumans.com/shop/?q=floral+marvel

mts

those are nice but I am never paying 30 bucks for a teeshirt

i second threadless if you get them at a sale.

Enc

You get what you pay for, generally.

mts

i still have $10 tees from threadless from like 15 years ago

Iruka

Threadless and DBH have incredibly similar product offerings and probably nearly identical printing processes. Not saying that as a knock to either, they are are both print on demand and have all over and standard designs, likely to similar results. Threadless flash sales are worth it if you are trying to refresh more than 1-2 shirts, just looking through the catalog, looks like some of the same artists are on both sites anyway.

I just checked and dbh still has this damn thing for sale/. If they still have my old shitty incubus tee, then there are still exclusive relics from the contest-only era, but both have moved to let artists just upload stuff.

In terms of "getting what you pay for" the biggest difference between the two sites is probably just their base products, rather than printing. If you want to really get into it, Threadless pays out less to artists during their sales, and its probably the bigger reason to buy from DBH or a site that doesn't have flash sales, but as a consumer I consider my budget first.

Calica

After checking out DBH and Threadless, the latter has better art, imho. Or better print placement, maybe? A ton of otherwise cool DBH shirts have their designs placed lower on the shirt than I'd like, or centered when they'd look better not.

edit: also, DBH has way more colors available in mens' shirts than womens'; lame.

WiseManTobes

I've gotten a few shirts from Teefury and they are still solid after dozens and dozens of washes and being worn like crazy.

Doodmann

Most of these shops buy from Canvas or Gildan, they're the two largest suppliers by a wide margin.

Buy what you like graphically.

Burtletoy

Yeah, like I said, full bleed is American apparel. Design by Humans was when I got my shirts from them ~10 years ago.

The shirts that are still intact despite a thousand wears and watches

But I can't find what dbh prints on, on their website now

mts

I know Woot used to use American apparel but stopped. Their shirts are nice but feel like they shrink

Tastyfish

I've got quite a few well aged Threadless ones, one trick is to wash them inside out. That definitely reduces the amount of wear on the art print, and honestly - smelly bits of clothing that need the wash are going to generally be on the inside anyway.

Calica

The problem I have with newer Woot shirts is the fabric itself wearing out quickly, not the art degrading.

Tastyfish

That's fair enough, though with the longer lasting shirts you'll get more wear and tear on the art print. Some designs work quite well with the "well loved" look with a few patches worn away, but others you might want to keep intact for longer.

Calica

The art on my older ones still looks great.

What are you doing to your poor shirts? :razz: