Sunday, February 22, 2009

Magic Las Vegas 2009

So we got to Las Vegas for the last day of the Magic and Pool trade shows to scope out some new brands to carry at THE FIFTH GALLERY.

I was real surprised to find that there were not even what it seemed a third..possible a fourth of streetwear brands representing than what we saw from last year. In short, the quantity of brands was kind of weak, probably largely because of the current economy. The show didn't seem as flashy or awesome as previously-catalogs were thinner, promo material like stickers (which I fiend for) and cool posters, fliers were not anywhere and everywhere like before....but i digress, I've never really been a fan of flash and hype, so we just checked out some brands and talked to some good folk about fashion, sports, materials, and such.

Brands that made us turn our heads were
Cardboard Robot for bags/satchels,
Married to the Mob had some great womens tees including a KRINK x MTTM joint and limited edition krink markers,
OG Abel had some killer tees and bandanas ,
Alter Ego from Hawai had some dope tees,
Rocksmith had some nice tees and fitteds,
The Originators had some dope hip hop inspired tees (whatup to Haps)
TERUO Artistry had some great ideas on how to take a printed tee up a notch
Antifashion had some nice wallets
Fivecrown had some great womens and mens tees-we will have some at the gallery soon
The Seventh Letter crew had the best fitted at MAGIC--look out for a new era/TSL "Rackers" cap that was dooooooope, they wouldnt let us take a picture though, and also dont have a release date..but guaranteed hot.

Being that we showcased with Phantazm last year, I didnt have a chance to check out Pool previously-but this year we checked it out and I was pretty impressed as the show seemed a little like a handmade/artsier sort of show which was cool. A lot of cool brands like
Tokidoki were repping with tees, kicks, toys, watches...everything.
Dynomighty Design had some handamade paper wallets that were pretty amazing.

We also went to the PROJECT show which was held at Mandalay Bay..it should be renamed PRETENTIOUS.
All the brands reps were too cool for school and hardly acknowledged us, possibly because we were dressed like the hip hop kids we are,maybe because we didn't have on skinny jeans...i dunno, but fuck it-their clothing all looked like the same wannabe retro hipster ish anyway.

Reebok and Adidas were in attendance at Project there also, but they didn't even acknowledge we were in there booth...lame...although Reebok had some cool pumps inspired by Gremlins; one a mogwai jump off, the other a gremlin jump off. They also had a cool concept in 7 deadly sins pumps. Adidas had some nice stuff, but we were pretty turned off by their attitude also, so fuggem.
heres a few flicks, there wasn't a lot going on, so hence a few flicks we self forceably took just for the blog.
Big ups to Rod and the whole Las Vegas UNDEFEATED crew..these Nike TOKI kicks are comfoooortable enough for the million miles of Las Vegas strip walking (and foot racing)..We missed these guys at Magic, but checked out the shop and picked up some gear afterwards-they had a party earlier in the week with Stussy that had Camp Lo performing.
These dudes were painting this sweet piece that sold to the owner of Kangol for $10,000 ..get money homies.


TERUO had some real cool original tees. the backs of the tees had embroidered patterns and stitched in patterned fabrics that played off each shirts colors...so basically no tee is the same. good idea.
OG Abel crew and Marc of Mofoz Visualz - Abel is one of the sickest artists out
Rocksmith slanging things
The Married to the Mob ladies were cool as ice--they have some great designs and have been one of the OG women streetwear brands-mad respect...and not only cuz they hooked us up with a limited Krink marker.

...and heres some flicks from the extracurricular

Here is after the show madness--at Minus 5 in Madalay Bay , Robin the waitress made a sweet custom tie for the homie Shawn from what used to be his sleeve (probably some bitch ass brand from Project will rip this off and show it next year)

Sweet tie homie Shawn and Airica

Minus 5 Ice bar at Mandalay Bay -big ups to bartenders Hot Heather, North Carolina, Robin and company...this was the coolest place (no pun)

Medium Rare steak nachos from Tacos and Tequila at Mandalay Bay...these were somewhat like heaven in food form
Mofoz Crew at Minus 5 ..the glasses were made of ice, so you could eat them or just chunk them top the ground and watch them break into millions of pieces