Never a label to shy away from the spotlight, Lacoste L!ve are literally living and breathing this trend for Spring/Summer 2013. Not only do they present their classic innovative thinking with their new collection, they have something very special up their sleeves.
Collaborating with 5 eclectic urban illustrators from around the world, Lacoste L!ve give us their take on Street Style. Widely recognised as the more edgy relative of the Lacoste family, L!ve has the freedom to allow their boundaries to be well and truly pushed. Queue a huge influx of individually creative designs, both original and iconic. Notably, Ben Newman, Honet, Elzo, Andy Rementer and Stevie Gee have provided the brainpower to this ‘L!ve-style’. The cogs have been turned/inspired from a firsthand experience of the urban movement. Each respective artist has carved out their own career from indulging their passions as street connoisseurs, from the misty depths of London, to the sprawling streets of Paris.
Ranging from witty character based designs, through to modern-day rockability, psychedelic, graff and surf, their prints pack the punches, reflecting their many influences.
Welcome to the wonderful world of Elzo…
Elzo’s illustrative collages are an instantly recognisable mix between art and contemporary graphics. Taking inspiration from engravings, comic drawing and photos, Elzo combines and deforms and colours the images on a computer before screen printing the final results.
“They [Lacoste] asked me to start from the idea of an African mask and so I just developed it in my own style.
I like to work in that way, it’s always interesting to be creative within some boundaries; it often leads to the most exciting work.”
A big hello to Honet…
Making a name for himself in the late 80s as one of graffiti’s pioneers and leading luminaries, Honet aka HNT has since expanded his creative horizons. Describing himself as both an illustrator and a graffiti artist, you may have seen his work with Lacoste L!VE before…
Back in 2011, Lacoste L!VE approached HNT to work on a mini capsule collection. This year, he came back to work on a new T-shirt design. “We didn’t really need more than a week for L!VE and myself to work out the line and the drawings. We both knew what we wanted from each other and it worked out nicely.”
When it comes to hand-drawn, no-one does it better than Andy Rementer…
“Hello, my name is Andy Rementer and I am a creative person from USA. I make art, illustrations, comics and animation.”
No stranger to collaboration projects, Andy Rementer has worked with MTV, The New York Times and many more. At Woodhouse, we’re pleased to be able to finally learn what the most famous Croc in designer menswear gets up to when he’s not busy being a fashion icon!