Hi everyone,
Erika here, with
another edition of “Have you heard of...?” featuring Mayamada. A truly clever, London based brand that mixes humor, much like that of Looney
Tunes with the bold visual elements of anime, that fans are all too familiar
with and love. You may recognize the name or have seen Mayamada in previous WORD posts, but in this one, I get a chance to
pick the brain of Nigel, a founding member, to see just how this
brand ticks and how they go about creating such a unique product. So sit back,
relax and get comfortable as I formally introduce you all to Mayamada.
KA-ME-HA-ME-HAAAAA!!!!
My name’s Nigel, I’m one of the founding members of
mayamada. To put it simply, mayamada is an anime inspired t-shirt brand set in
a fantasy television network...with an all animal cast :-)
You can think of us like a mashup of Looney Tunes and
Japanese TV.
Mayamada,
interesting name, how did it come to be the name of your brand?
The name came about in the early days when we were still
throwing out ideas for making t-shirts.
We started in a completely different direction and
originally wanted to call ourselves “Mayazuki Yamada”, but ended
up shortening that to “mayamada”.
Don’t ask me where “Mayazuki Yamada” came from though!
Initially, what
influenced your decision to create a t-shirt brand?
The decision came from an email discussion between our
friends. The idea to make t-shirts was
suggested and a few of us jumped on it.
We didn’t know much about branding or business and just
wanted make tees to sell at our university.
We didn’t even get that far though...
We quickly discovered you need an actual plan if you want to
do things properly (go figure), so we sat down and thought things through. That’s when we came up with mayamada as it is
today.
Anime is
definitely a central theme or love that is evident in your tees; explain its
significance in inspiring you to create your brand around it.
We watched a lot of anime growing up (I got sucked in
through Dragonball Z). Anime is really visual and we thought the style would
work well with tee designs.
My personal favourite thing is it has its own distinct
personality that matches well with us as we have some “unique” ideas too.
Are there other
things, besides Anime, that inspire or influence you creatively when creating
and designing tees for your brand?
Humour is a big influence for us. We try not to take things
too seriously and we want to get other people smiling too.
Food is a big part of the brand as well. If you haven't
noticed it yet you will! We travelled to Japan a few years back and spent a lot
of time sampling different great dishes...cakes especially.
Being in the
Indie tee scene can have its many obstacles, what is the most challenging
obstacle your brand has faced and how did you work through it?
Finding our audience was a big challenge for us. When you're
starting out, getting recognition is a hard thing to do. We made the effort to go to the major
conventions in London and meet people into the same things we are.
Organising our own events has helped too as we've met a lot
of great people that are into what we’re doing.
In looking at
your site, I noticed your brand is also in the process of producing a manga
book; tell us about it and how you think it may impact the success of your
t-shirt brand.
As well as clothing, we like creating stories. It's the
reason we came up with the brand we did and can’t wait to start creating more
volumes after this first one.
The book will allow us to tell the story of mayamada so it's
not just limited to t-shirts.
As mayamada is based on the idea of fantasy television
shows, we’ll be creating manga based on each of them. The first one is the
Samurai Chef: A cooking show where the Chef judges contestants food by
attacking it.
Ultimately this will give people another thing to enjoy and
bring them into the world more and more.
It might even get them into manga in general. If they pick up the books
we make they might be drawn into it and check out some other stuff too.
We want to create a very cool and positive brand that’s
known around the world for great t-shirts, manga and events. Oh and a store in Japan! When we get to that
point then we're happy.
Aside from that we want to be able to create animation based
on the character stories. That's another of our long term goals.
What do you
think separates Mayamada from other brands?
The world and the characters for one. A fantasy television
network and animal cast is a little out there so I can't imagine too many
people have thought of it before!
I think that plus the mix of clothing, story and events are
something that separates us too.
Let’s say you’re
walking down the street, you slip on some melted frozen yogurt, bump your head
and travel through time (not necessarily back in time), what are three places
or time periods you would like to end up in?
The Renaissance period would be one. There were a lot of new things happening at
once. It would have been a great period
to learn and discover new things before computers existed.
I’d like to also travel forward to a period where we’ve
figured out space travel (I don’t want to be the first to try it) and we’re
zipping around from planet to planet Futurama style.
Lastly, I would go back into recent time and find out who
wasted perfectly good frozen yogurt!
What are two
things you never leave home without?
My phone because it is how I do a good chunk of work on as
well as keeping in touch with friends.
The other is my mp3 player. I think I'm one of the few
people that still carry a separate device for that but it goes everywhere with
me.
If you could trade places with ANY one person (celebrity or non) in the world, for 48 hours, who would it be and why?
Tony Hsieh of Zappos. I read his book which was a great read. He created a great company from something so simple and has customers and employees happy to be a part of it. It would be great to trade places and get to better know how he thinks.
I have a few favourites. There is a cool video game inspired
brand called Insert Coin Clothing that is based in the UK. We met them at a
convention last year and I really like what they are doing.
Looking at the US, I'm also a big fan of Ugmonk. There's a
level of genuine quality about everything they put out that’s great to see.
My personal favourite is Johnny Cupcakes. I love his story
and it was a big inspiration. I also like the element of fun that he's put into
his entire company plus the fact it’s run by family and friends. A great
example of an indie brand.
Now for a
round of “this” or “that,” ya ready?
Crew neck or
V-neck
Crew neck
Scrambled eggs
or Over-easy eggs
Scrambled
Retro Jordans or
Vans
Jordans
Aston Martin or
Range Rover
Aston Martin
Death Note or
Deadman Wonderland
Death Note
Vinyl or Digital
downloads
I'd love to say vinyl...but digital.
Hip Hop or
Dubstep
Hip Hop
Vintage or
Modern
Modern
Distressed denim
or Classic khaki
Khaki
Red Bull or
Espresso
Red Bull
Early Bird or
Night Owl
Early bird
Any shout outs?
To our friends and family that have helped us get this far
and to the people that come to us at conventions and events and show support
for mayamada. It’s the reason we keep going!
There you have it
guys, another edition of “Have you heard of...?” featuring Mayamada. Make sure
to stop by their gift shop and check out all the dope gear they have to offer
available now!
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