Ever since Kanye West released his own merch of vintage tees and hoodies back in 2013 for his Yeezus World Tour, every single musician had to up their style game and forever changed how artists brand themselves.
Reclaiming and redefining the street cred of the once regarded uniform of the wayward, arena memorabilia slowly became one of the most-coveted items for this generation with Kanye West being one of the first ones in the more contemporary context to harness this opportunity. Before becoming a sell-out trend, Travis Scott soon followed his footsteps—even outdoing him. From Reese’s cereal boxes, McDonald’s limited-edition meals, Nike collabs, his first virtual concert, a custom skin on Fortnite, and his sold-out Astroworld merch that launched a thousand bootlegs, Travis has been on a winning streak this 2020. And more often than not, he’s either decked in head-to-toe designer, shirtless, or in, you guessed it, a vintage tee.
Sure, it made an early-ish comeback in 2016 with almost all fashion brands putting a spin on rock n’ roll designs and celebrities making it their off-duty uniform (not that Kendall and her friends actually listen to Slipknot or Metallica), but the trend hasn’t quite faded in the Manila scene yet. Beyond the depths of the oversaturated resell market, here are 8 of the best online stores to cop (or customize) some vintage tees.
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1. CASH WAVES
Not only can you get good old pop culture tees at Cash Waves, but you can have your custom shirt designed too. Whether you want it with your face on like Blythe’s or your favorite music icons, imagination is the only currency here. The design duo behind the brand also share a lot of aesthetic wallpapers they’ve created on their respective pages in case you’re looking for some inspo.
2. STUFF NI KSTOFF
Starting off with mainly selling vintage WWE tees, Stuff ni Kstoff stands out among the crowd because of the well-written stories and nostalgic visuals behind all the garms. Aside from the rare gems like Apple’s 1998 iMac G3 Promo shirt or a High School Musical childhood grail, they school us in on the difference of fake from bootleg to the effect of online shopping on the vintage market. They also have a heat check series on 90s ‘toons!
3. RETROGRADE PH
Aside from their love for vintage Ralph Lauren Polo bears and windbreakers, Retrograde PH also has those hard-to-find Tekken shirts by Namco, retro USA destination tees, and bootleg merch featuring icons of 90s pop culture.
4. VINTAGE GRAIL PLUG PH
A rare Kanye West tee from The College Dropout era? Bootleg Dennis Rodman shirts? Actual band merch from Metallica and Nirvana? Vintage Grail Plug has all of them—but it comes with a high price. Grail pieces don’t just miraculously appear on the P50 rack don’t they?
5. PLEASE COLLECT
From their curated 90s NBA tees to bootleg Britney Spears and Leonardo de Caprio, Please Collects also sells vintage comic book and iconic movie shirts like Scar Face, Pulp Fiction in their drops.
6. SEASONS PASS PH
Seasons Pass has been well-known in the local vintage scene for building a community of lovers of second-hand and giving a platform to other sellers on their annual round table via Instagram live where they do bidding, live selling, and showing the viewers the best pieces that they’ve ever managed to cop and will never let go.
7. RAP BOOTLEGS PH
Where else can you get a quality Frank Ocean or Rihanna tee? Rap Bootlegs makes vintage shirts of your favorite hiphop artists from Drake to Tyler the Creator. Oh, and they also recently made a Taylor Swift tee for the Swifties. Who knows? Maybe they’ll drop an Ariana bootleg soon.
8. WHAT’S YOUR KARMA MANILA
The good, the bad, the karma. Founded in 2016, What’s Your Karma reworks vintage tees, comforters, beach towels straight from the 90s into the sickest jackets and even sneakers. Our top pick would be the custom Scarface utility jacket that was reworked from patches of an old button-down.
