Collection 2: Nature's Candy
Fruity fruited fruit.
A collection inspired by exotic fruits from Southeast Asia.
I was going to write something long and deep about cultural roots – about how the city I was born and raised in is built on Asian and Mexican immigrants; about all the different ways fruit is culturally incorporated into the city; about where my parents came from and their unorthodox ways of showing affection through cut fruit; about a phrase my ma used to say, surrounding ‘planting what you eat’ – but I scrapped it all.
Fruit means different things to different people. I think most of the time it’s for the taste or it being healthy, usually something positive. I think it’s ok to just enjoy things that are good.
Fruit is good.
Longan Vest
Everybody should have a vest in their closet.
I remember in elementary school, my mom would buy fleece vests and have me wear them. I would hate it, because I thought it made me look like a nerd. She had a functional reason for making me wear it though. She believed I’d stop getting chest infections, colds, and asthma if I kept my chest warm. She was right, but I didn’t care. I was the kid who thought wearing multiple jackets to school was lame or even bringing an umbrella to school was uncool. I was tripping. Vests are fucking cool. All types of vests from puffers, fleece, v-necks, even tuxedo vests – all drip. I started wearing a lot more vests from highschool to now and I’ve become a vest guy.
This was my first vest and I wanted something loud yet functional. Taking inspiration from longan, we found a fabric very similar to the outside of the fruit. Blending it with an ivory/off-white fabric, we made a reversible light puffer vest. When it’s a calm, subtle fit day but you want a little sauce, throw on the white side. But when you wake up feeling like fine shyt and need something vibrant and rowdy, go with the yellow side.
The vest colors are based off the fruit, from the skin to the inside. The yellow/brown represents the skin and the ivory/off white represents the flesh of longan.
Durian Sweater
Spiky fruit falls from a high tree and makes loud whipping sound.
Stank Fruit
Hailing from Southeast Asia, durian is a special fruit to me. The texture, smell, flavor, and even how they are harvested, produces a 1-of-1 fruit. With the range of colors for the fruit and the texture being extremely spiky on the outside yet soft on the inside, the inspiration for the garment was endless. But in the end, I felt like I didn’t execute to my highest level. I realized how difficult it is to produce cool shit*. Eventually, Garment Log will produce cool shit, just not at this stage. After pitching a few ideas to manufacturers and them basically saying, “Chill out lil bro”, I decided to create something a bit more optimal to wear in an everyday setting**. Ultimately, I opted for a yellow rib knit that includes brown vertical lines and a green embroidered logo.
*With references like 2000s studded belts and spiked gauge earrings (chokeholds for our generation), spiked boots and sneakers (luxury brands like Christian Louboutin), spiked biker jackets (I.E. Kanye’s Balençiaga spiked jacket), and even Badson’s padded jackets, I had high hopes of making a cool textured garment. The reality is R&D for crazy pieces takes money and skills that I don’t have yet .
**A design language I’ve tried to model are products that are basic enough to be worn everyday but have a unique feature. Subtle loudness, but maybe we could’ve been a bit more loud.
Looking back, this item was simple in concept but a bit difficult to manufacture. I went through multiple phases of almost not releasing this garment because of sizing, colors (maybe it should’ve been more of a subtle yellow and not as vibrant but idk lmk), logistics etc. I learned a lot; however, I plan on revisiting the ideas that weren’t executed well and playing with more abstract designs in the near future, eventually creating our world with less limits.
Fruit Tee shirt
When form meets function and design…
Looking at the history of fruits and agriculture within the world, stickers and other labels are used to organize types of fruits/distributors/etc. The function of the sticker is consistent in helping separate one batch of produce from another. As it is in everything, branding became important, and companies brought in vibrant colors, mascots, and creativity to differentiate them from others. It’s beautiful when humans add playfulness to function, especially when an object can just be printed with a barcode or number and be done. That’s where art and design meets form and function. It’s not essential to getting the job done, but it’s what humans do best – create.
The T-shirt is cut and sewn to present a cropped and boxy fit (first cut & sew t-shirt made for glog!), with a fruit stamp logo placed on the corner as it would be on a fruit and a collection of exotic fruits presented on the back .
Quick plug: Instagram that collects fruit stamps assets: https://www.instagram.com/fruit_stickers/?hl=en
Mangosteen Pants
Our first run at pant production.
Inspired by a more rare fruit in the western market, mangosteen acted as the blueprint. Nicknamed the “queen of fruits”, it hails from Southeast Asia and presents a taste that’s hard to describe but is said to be a blend of lychee, strawberry, peach, citrus, and more. Using the colors of the mangosteen, we included a green dyed waistband and a deep purple body. We also included a pendant for the zipper pockets to model the stalk of the fruit*.
Designing pants was interesting, as proportions matter a lot more than in other garments and the range can be pretty wide – some have long legs, short legs, long backs, short backs; humans are different. Traveling in the short king territory, pants are often long and need to be hemmed. So sampling and designing was a challenge for this, but I think I hit the mark for what most average people will like. And if you’re part of the compact community, sorry friend. Wear it baggy or get it hemmed (like you usually do 😀).
* This fruit was introduced and often talked about by our immigrant parents who grew up in Southeast Asia, but we rarely had a chance to try it. Mangosteen is such a rare fruit in the western market due to two main reasons. The first being how hard it is to grow, taking almost 8-10 years for a mangosteen tree to start bearing fruit despite being in an ideal tropical environment. Secondly, the U.S. banned mangosteens in 2000 due to concerns surrounding the Asian fruit flies, but the ban was lifted in 2007. It’s still considered a delicacy and is very expensive due to the conditions listed above.
The number of petals on the mangosteen stalk represents the number of cloves of fruit that are inside! We loved the design of the stalk as it really does look like nature took its time to stamp this beautiful fruit.
Additional: A rambutan version of this pant was created as well. Now staying as a sample forever, we decided to not release it due to production issues.
Glog Props:
Used for a variety of reasons including shoots, stickers, and more:
Garment Log Produce Stenciled Crate:
Garment Log Lunch Bag & Nature’s Candy Box:
Garment Log Collection 2 Stickers:
End Note:
As always, if you got this far, thank you from the bottom of my heart. There’s a million clothing brands out there and I’m still not sure what makes mine different. I create to learn more about myself, express myself a bit, and have a medium to tell stories that are valuable to me. The lines get blurred because business can influence what art is made, but I hope to get to a point where I can walk on that thin line of balancing both art and business in a way that I’m happy with. Thank you for spending your time reading the glog! Come back soon.