The Origin
BYRDZ is a clothing brand that I created back in my sophmore year of high school (2017). I was just siting in my room one night and thought to myself, "I'm gonna make a clothing brand". I began thinking of random names that hadn't been thought of before. I thought of names like "Dead Shot" "sUpEr" "Birda s Eye View". At the time my favorite Hip-Hop artist at the time was Travis Scott, and one of my favorite bands of all time is Lynyrd Skynyrd. So in homage to both of them, BYRDZ was the name that was locked in. For the next 3 years, I shelved this project constantly. But in senior year when we were told that our senior project was free of our choosing, I knew this was my time to finally prioritize this long running dream.
The Project
My original plan for this project was far more complex then what it turned out to be. When school was made into online classes, I began to stress on what was to come next because this all I had been anticipating and waiting for. The thought of maybe doing a different project had not even crossed my mind. With craft stores and t-shirt whole sellers closing their stores, started to get worried on how my project would turn out. My project had already been approved althoguh I had no foundation for it. I considered scrapping my dream and just making a music project, but I kept holding back and telling myself theres got to be an alternative, some way to continue even in the slightest. I had suddenly remembered that there is this amazing thing called transfer paper, a paper that can be heat transfered to clothing to display any image you print on it. Although transfer paper isn't as great as a silk screen, it was a start. I soon after ordered a printer and transfer paper to finally get this started. The next roadblock was finding a t-shirt wholeseller that was still open. I spent a day and a half driving around town in hopes atleast 1 place would be open. Sadly not a single place was open. I had to resort to amazon to order t-shirts. But hey, as long as I can get this done I'm not gonna complain.
My Goals
The main three things I wanted myself to learn during this project were to first know how to work with a graphic design program, Master my craft in printing, and learn how to promote my brand. I've attempted to use adobe illustrator in the past, I HATED it. But for this project I resorted to using G.I.M.P. which is a free alternative. I forced my self to try and overcome the difficulties of learning to use the program because I knew it was something I needed to know and use if I wanted my ideas to come to life. As for printing, It sounds a lot easier than you think. Now I'm not saying it was very difficult, but it did take practice to get the hang of it. Promoting my brand was one thing I did want to learn to do, but wasn't something I focused a whole lot on just because I wasn't doing this to make my brand blow up or become a huge success.
BYRDZ is a clothing brand that I created back in my sophmore year of high school (2017). I was just siting in my room one night and thought to myself, "I'm gonna make a clothing brand". I began thinking of random names that hadn't been thought of before. I thought of names like "Dead Shot" "sUpEr" "Birda s Eye View". At the time my favorite Hip-Hop artist at the time was Travis Scott, and one of my favorite bands of all time is Lynyrd Skynyrd. So in homage to both of them, BYRDZ was the name that was locked in. For the next 3 years, I shelved this project constantly. But in senior year when we were told that our senior project was free of our choosing, I knew this was my time to finally prioritize this long running dream.
The Project
My original plan for this project was far more complex then what it turned out to be. When school was made into online classes, I began to stress on what was to come next because this all I had been anticipating and waiting for. The thought of maybe doing a different project had not even crossed my mind. With craft stores and t-shirt whole sellers closing their stores, started to get worried on how my project would turn out. My project had already been approved althoguh I had no foundation for it. I considered scrapping my dream and just making a music project, but I kept holding back and telling myself theres got to be an alternative, some way to continue even in the slightest. I had suddenly remembered that there is this amazing thing called transfer paper, a paper that can be heat transfered to clothing to display any image you print on it. Although transfer paper isn't as great as a silk screen, it was a start. I soon after ordered a printer and transfer paper to finally get this started. The next roadblock was finding a t-shirt wholeseller that was still open. I spent a day and a half driving around town in hopes atleast 1 place would be open. Sadly not a single place was open. I had to resort to amazon to order t-shirts. But hey, as long as I can get this done I'm not gonna complain.
My Goals
The main three things I wanted myself to learn during this project were to first know how to work with a graphic design program, Master my craft in printing, and learn how to promote my brand. I've attempted to use adobe illustrator in the past, I HATED it. But for this project I resorted to using G.I.M.P. which is a free alternative. I forced my self to try and overcome the difficulties of learning to use the program because I knew it was something I needed to know and use if I wanted my ideas to come to life. As for printing, It sounds a lot easier than you think. Now I'm not saying it was very difficult, but it did take practice to get the hang of it. Promoting my brand was one thing I did want to learn to do, but wasn't something I focused a whole lot on just because I wasn't doing this to make my brand blow up or become a huge success.