Here are some great pictures of the great punk band Reflector playing a gig in Dong Bei.
Look carefully and you will see Li Peng the singer guitarist is wearing our latest designs the Retro Rocket Boy and our first and incredibly popular tattoo design.
I do quite a lot of TV shows, some are great fun, like kuai le da ben ying, others are incredibly stressful, like the BBC reality TV show i did last year. Now I’ve got one of those stressful ones coming up. Its China’s version of a popular TV show in the west called The Dragon’s Den. The format is quite simple. Entrepreneurs with ideas or small businesses like mine present their businesses to super successful entrepreneurs (I’ve heard the Chinese show has some really famous ones) in a hope they might want to invest. So its going to be me, presenting Plastered in front of the cameras and some very smart people in the hope they might want to inject something into my business. Its a great opportunity for sure, but doesn’t help me sleep at night. The show will be on CCTV2 and I’ll be sure to post a link to it on this blog when its online.
A few weeks back we were approached by Zippo, the well-known, super-cool lighter brand that has a really strong presence in China. They asked us if we were interested in designing some artwork for them that would go on their lighters and then on Plastered T-shirts. Naturally we jumped on the opportunity and got working on the designs.
We are proud to announce… that this is the first Zippo-Plastered design. Zippo, like Plastered, loves and supports Chinese rock music and we’re thrilled that these designs will be launched at a rock event organized by Zippo at Yu Gong Yi Shan on Friday May 28th featuring the likes of Brain Failure and The Subs. There will be six events and five designs… so watch this space for more info.
Limited edition Zippo lighters featuring these cool Plastered designs will also be on sale around China and in Plastered stores in the coming months.
Purchase a zippo at any authorized retailers and get vouchers to redeem 2 FREE tiket for zippo Hot List Night from Plastered store.
Plastered 8: 61 Nanluogu Xiang Dongcheng District,Beijing
Tel:010-64064872-8003
Ticket Pre-sale: RMB50
Ticket at Door: RMB80
Every now and then I get mail from people who have seen me on TV or people who I have met when giving creative lectures at universities around China. This has to be one of my favourites. Its really nice to inspire people to follow their dreams and ideas and thats pretty much what i try to encourage when giving lectures. This particular parcel arrived at the store this weekend. From a cool guy in Xian who started his own brand after being inspired by Plastered. His brand is called MOMO and their shop is at 大唐芙蓉园西门丁字路口西南角芙蓉坊4号楼1楼 http://www.heymomo.com/ . They sent me a super cool t shirt and a bottle of retro orange juice, also a very kind letter attached that made my day. Good luck to MOMO on their creative adventure.
I had a really pleasant surprise today when Beijing Renmin Guang Buo Dian Tai (Beijing’s People’s Radio) presented me with a lovely award. I got second prize for the best interview on their station. Its not often I win prizes, in fact I’ve only won 2, conker champion on Barfield school in 1981 and British Entrepreneur of the year in China in 2008. This second prize will be hung on my wall at home along with the others. So …thank you very much Beijing People’s radio for the certificate and a lovely clock.
I’ve always been scared about opening up shops in other cities, I”ve usually just pursued the wholesale path to distribute product but finally I found a shop in Tian Zi Fang (Tai Keng Lu) in a prime location and I’ve signed the deal and now I have to do it. I’m not sure of many Beijing street brands that have made the leap from Beijing to Shanghai, at least not from Nan Luo Gu Xiang. So we are proud to be the first. We hope to be open in the beginning of June if all runs smoothly. We’ve also partnered up with the coolest hangout place in Tian Zi Fang, the Kommune, they will be helping us raise our profile there and we will be designing cool gear for them. So keep an eye on this space for more news on Shanghai getting Plastered!
The affordable art fair was a big success for Plastered art works, we sold 3 pieces of the stained glass which now brings my total to 6. I really wasn’t expecting to sell anything as they were priced quite high. I got loads of text messages and emails from those who went to the show and saw the windows which was really nice. It was also nice to see so many people gathering around them at the show. Now I’m working on my next idea which is incredibly complicated but should be a lot of fun.
Its always nice to see celebrities getting Plastered, in this case its Ruan Jing Tian and Ying Da. In the case of Ying Da I was invited onto his program so I gave him a long sleeve t-shirt that he requested, in the case of Ruan Jing Tian he came to our flagship store and bought it himself. I’ve never met him, everyone in our Plastered office seem to like him so we’re pretty happy about his purchase.
In the quest to continue to create something new I had an idea to work with local tattoo artists I randomly met one day through my dear friend Li Peng of Reflector Band fame. He introduced me to Wang Ke and her husband, they have their own tattoo studio on Bei Luo Gu Xiang. I spent several hours with them giving them ideas for Plastered tattoo I wanted to create. The results so far have been spectacular. Working with local artists has been a theme for Plastered since we started back in 2006, its particularly nice when they live 400m from your home and you don’t have to leave the hu tongs.
The idea for this tattoo came from revolutionary opera, something I’ve always wanted to work on, I explained to Wang Ke, who drew this particular bit of artwork, that i wished to have two sexy ladies holding guns a mention of my home Beijing and the rest was pretty much down to Wang Ke. We have 3 more tattoo inspired pieces in the mix right now, we also have a special Plastered tattoo logo. I will post them here as soon as they are finished.
Here are some pics of Wang Ke and her husband and the artwork.
When I moved to Nan Luo Gu Xiang in 2003 with my family to pursue our dream of living in a shared courtyard and create a big family I never expected Nan Luo Gu Xiang to boom the way it has. After I opened Plastered in May 2006 I watched the street flourish, lots of other cool brands came along and some great cafes and restaurants too. Recently however a lot of these restaurants and shops are closing down which is a real shame.
Notably Mirch Masala the Indian restaurant closed its doors after the rent went up to 600,000rmb a year, the boss from Indian closed up and moved to Ri Tan to open another in a cheaper location. Fish Nation also just closed its doors, probably Beijing’s best fish and chip restaurant, I’m not sure about their rent but I know its gone very high. Then today saddest of all Grifted closed shop, probably my favorite brand on the street, they actually created something new rather than copying Plastered, which was very refreshing.
Its going to be hard to keep the street cool, traditionally the small creative brands are not always the best at business, so as rents go up they have to leave and in their place all too often open up generic tourist shops doing nothing but resale which is boring. So as the street become more boring the rents will go down again, its much like the landlords are committing suicide going for the highest possible price only to ruin the streets feel and then the rents go down again.
Here are a few pics taken in 2004. I’m certainly not going to be closing shop, I feel passionate about creative new products and designs to inspire our much loved customers, I also feel passionately about Nan Luo Gu Xiang, where I started my business and where my 3 daughters have lived since they were born in Beijing.
