How I Designed a Game Around Streetwear

Geometric Eye was the first design that I drew for the Teemill store. I had no idea what kind of store I was building, other than sustainable. I knew I wanted it to be different.
At that stage I was cycling between everything from 90s retro symbols to geometric animals with no decisions. I knew I wanted to use my old art.

The first design, the geometric eye sketch and printed version.

Redesigning 20yr old characters

I took some of my old characters, drawings and sketches and put them in the store. I didn’t have a reason why. Some I redesigned slightly, and some I kept the same.

These became Logic, Tenet, Ultraviolet and Sun Eater.
Gradually, as I added more art, illegible to all but to me, the world was emerging.

Their stories were unfolding.
The characters were evolving and before I knew it I had a psychostasia judge,  a slightly too experimental planet builder, an intergalactic backpacker who stopped by for the music and bubble wrap and an intergalactic star maggot who is happily munching on dying stars.

Unfortunately, that last one is heading toward ours.

Mapping game to garment

That was really the easy part. I researched different ways games communicate rules, worlds, progression, player behaviour, consequence and more, across wildly different games and media, and then figured out what my existing world could mechanically do.

What happened to sustainability?

I leaned heavily into sustainability messaging those first few months and discovered then that sustainability on its own wasn’t going to move the needle. I had to make it worthwhile. Mean something.

One of the biggest things we do is circularity. And it’s one of the last things we do as people.

So I built recycling into the game twice. In play, Recycle undoes your opponent's last move. Outside the game, the same idea continues through the clothes: scan the QR code in the care label, return the garment when you're finished with it, and it goes back into the system to become something else.

I’m not claiming I’ve solved the problem, but I am trying to make participation part of the thing.

Alternate Reality Streetwear Game

The clothes are the artifacts. The cards are where you play. The comics are where the characters come alive.

Different parts of the same world.

Game to garment

The cards and the artifacts (clothing) are now coherent. The final designs are being added over the next few weeks.

Next, I'll be finishing the cards and working on getting them into the hands of our testers.

If you would like to test the game, you can find out more here.

Dance Tenet

There is a small chance that I have lost touch with reality. That’s not a bad thing; I am building another one.
The Canis is an original world expressed through streetwear, comics and playable artifacts.

It’s On

Raptor 1 and Raptor Wakes as dusty recovered artifacts.

There is much to be revealed, but the game has officially started.

Hours of web building, alt text, and thousands of moments in between figuring out language and images, and I can’t stop thinking about the cards and the points system behind them.

I cannot wait to get started on the comics and the cards. I’m a systems person. This really is my bag. I have wanted to make my own comic for as long as I can remember.

The Cards

The first part of The Canis streetwear game is live; the cards are an additional layer. They will be playable. More on that when my brain produces it. Signal Lost.

The Comics

Trying to take this on by myself might be the most insane thing I have done yet. Most comics are made by several people. I still have a business to run, designs to create, story to write and characters to develop.

Thankfully, half The Canis writes itself, the hard part is getting it out of my head.

Please send help. We accept magical caterpillars, beans and dolls.  

The world is evolving.

I think moon eaters are coming. I know Logic is growing something else. Tenet will most likely hijack my brain at some point.

And Ultraviolet is somewhere in another universe, getting more annoyed by the minute.

Can a Streetwear ARG Change Clothing Recycling?

We all know fashion has a waste problem.
Some of you might not know how big it is.

Less than 15% of clothing is recycled globally each year; yet we produce 92 million tons of textile waste in the same period. 

Most of that ends up burned or in landfill. 

Can storytelling change behaviour?

People are not going to stop producing fashion. It’s a part of who we are. How we make it, what we make it out of, and what we do with it after, is all going to change.

Historically, we’ve never had to worry about what happened to it after we were done. Can how we feel about what we’ve bought change that?

A photo representing the circular fashion process, organic cotton fibres clean enough to break down and reuse.

Why organic cotton isn’t enough.

If it was only that easy. Changing how people behave is hard.

Cotton is one of the most toxic fabrics on the planet, synthetics and micro plastics are another big topic. We’ve seen incredible and ridiculous innovations in textiles, but these are more often clickbait than sustainable.

GOTS certified organic cotton is grown free from harmful chemicals making it easier to recycle.

But organic cotton alone is not the main reason why most people buy.

Building a streetwear ARG.

The world I am building has game play elements. Comics, games and a series are in the pipeline, but the overarching question is how can we change behaviour?

A small incentive is a start. But is it enough to make you go through the steps of returning a t-shirt?

We all have clothing we value; we tend to keep those items. Often regardless of condition. What we do with the stuff we don’t want, or is damaged, is barely a thought.

The Canis is the experiment.

Do we not recycle because that’s the way it’s always been and ‘all it will take’ is a few regulations?

How long will these regulations take to become globally enforceable?

Or can we do something about it in the meantime?

I’m not saying I have the solution. But maybe, when you’re done with your tee or it’s looking a little haggard, you’ll hear Tenet’s voice saying, “The Canis takes it back” and scan the QR code.