From Our Founder: Behind the Coffee Bots Shirt

Today we are sitting down with Charles, the founder/designer, to understand why he created this Coffee Bots shirt and the inspiration behind it.  We have a little teaser of the designer process video here, from sketches to final products. Let's get started and see what Charles has to say.

What made you pick coffee?

Charles: Well, first of all, I love coffee and all the local coffee shops we have here in San Francisco. And after I left my job at Disney, I was constantly sketching at St. Clare coffee. Unfortunately they have now closed.  I was working on my first collection at the time, so I picked coffee as one of the inspirations. 

Can you tell us more about these coffee mugs?

Charles: Ok, so coffee beans is a bit too normal for me and the red flower of the coffee plants is also too ornate. I thought maybe I could make these coffee mugs come to life like they are in Beauty and the Beast. I like to give my work a narrative to make sense of everything. 

When you look at my print, when the mugs are facing down, their eyes are closed, like they are sleeping. Then the eyes are open when the mugs are up and ready to be filled with coffee, just like us when we wake up in the morning. 

And so the "bots" part is basically coffee mugs being like a robot?

Charles: Exactly, I want to somehow incorporate the tech part into my print because we have so many tech companies like Facebook and Google and not to mention a lot of startups. And I'm very much influenced by working in the Games industry in the past, drawing a lot of fun characters.  So why not putting the twos together.

What is the most challenging part of process while you are working on this design?

Charles: Picking the fabric. I kept getting pushbacks from my supplier saying that many of the fabrics I wanted to use were out of stock. I was lucky to find this fabric and I think it works very well. I want the print to be more obscure and invite you in to look closely and guess what it is.

How has the response been so far?

Charles: People love it. I think I found a good medium for people who don't usually wear shirts with loud prints, they are ok with this one.  It's great to also see how people are talking about the print, some people are seeing trucks, some people are seeing tractors, even a turtle.  I like that my prints are connecting people together. We all have a laugh at the end, right, that's what matters.

Thank you so much for chatting with us.

Charles: Haha, my pleasure and let's get some more coffee, shall we?

Check out the Coffee Bots Shirt here

Until next time, Stay stylish!