At manckind* humor is serious business. The designs here riff on music, film, literature, and pop culture—twisting familiar references until they feel fresh, funny, and sometimes maybe a little bit subversive. About 88%** of the designs are music-driven because songs aren’t just soundtracks; they’re memory triggers and identity markers. A single lyric can pull you back to a moment in time, or a place, or a feeling. I'm hoping these designs work in the same way and that they resonate with folk.
There's a scene In the film Flash Gordon when Dr. Zarkov resists being brainwashed by Ming The Merciless's henchmen by trying to cling onto his memories, including the music of The Beatles. That’s what music, and culture in general, does: it grounds us, connects us, and keeps us human in a world that could do with more substantive punning.
Amongst other things.
There’s also a punk streak here—DIY over decoration and honesty over airbrush. The Clash and the Pistols—two of my favourite bands, especially the former—weren’t polished but they showed up and did it their way.
Same idea here.
My designs are simple by, er...design..."Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" as Da Vinci is supposed to have said. Plus, I still have much more to learn as a designer before I can go full complex.
Or even just a little bit complex.
Also, the mockups are deliberately obvious—stock models*** laid over my own unglamorous Manchester photos—because it's the idea in each design that matters most. And the Manchester background in each mockup connects to that specific design in some way—however tenuous that may be.
I have only recently launched this website, and so the designs I have thus far will be added to on a weekly basis. I also hope to have a 'We Are Manckind' kind of thing going on: where anyone—Mancunian or not—can talk about a particular design that resonates with them.
There are only a handful of designs connected to Manchester at the moment but, as I mentioned before, more will be added to the website every week..
Every design carries a layer of wordplay, nostalgia, and commentary-intentional or otherwise. Sometimes it’s as simple as that substantive pun; sometimes it’s two seemingly incongruous ideas colliding to make something new — like identity itself. If any of the designs make you laugh, think, or feel a jolt of recognition, then it’s done a large part of its job.
There's a lot of things that can be said about identity; not just in relation to my designs but also in general.That is something that I plan to develop as this website hopefully grows.
Suffice it to say, identity is lived, felt, sung, and can be worn on a T-shirt. And put on a wall. And carried over the shoulder. And sipped from a mug.
Or slurped.
Zia
*My website developer and I are Mancs, hence the name.
**Worked it out on a calculator.
**The models in the mockups are wearing the actual T-shirt brand being sold on this website.