29 May,2012 10:37 AM IST | | Ruchika Kher
Rajveen Khandelwal and Gaurav Agarwal moved back to India after a considerable time in US, they were keen on starting their own enterprise. At the same time, they wanted a business pursuit that was interesting and out-of-the-box. From their extensive research emerged the idea of Wear Your Opinion, an online store that sells T-shirts that reflect current events and the socio-political scenario in our country.
Message on a tee
"Wear Your Opinion is about great T-shirt designs created in-house as well as contributed by designers across India; it's about designs that are socially relevant. We invite designers to look at our society, culture, system and pinpoint things that ridicule, trouble and annoy us. The idea is to broadly bring out the Indian-ness in us. Next, we require them to bring those societal things onto fun tees in the form of beautifully executed artworks with a message," explains Rajveen.
A concept and design by designer Saksham, this T-shirt mocks the multi-crore 3G scam that rocked the nation last year and still continues to make headlines
Wear Your Opinion retails out of wyo.in releases one original and exclusive design every week at Rs 399. After a week, the design is moved in the archive section where it is available for Rs 449. A witty write up and complete credits to the designer are provided on the website with each T-shirt. For every design that is selected, the website pays Rs 5,000 and adding to that a royalty of 5% for over 300 tees sold.
The Antilla T-shirt is a spoof on the most talked-about building in the city. It has been Designed by famous illustrator Hemant Morparia.
Close check
However, getting a design selected is not an easy task. A panel of artists scrutinises the design and unless totally convinced, it is selected to be printed on the T-shirt. "We have an advisory designer panel that consists of senior artists from the advertisement and entertainment world. This panel not only helps us with in-house creation but also reviews the artwork that is submitted by other artists. We are also in constant search of artists who see things differently and we approach these with our ideas and concepts," informs the co-founder.u00a0Wyo.in calls college students, young working professionals, primarily people in the age group of 18-30 years as their target audience, "But tees go well with all age groups as long as they can relate to the concept," admits Rajveen.
The design in this T-shirt depicts that in India cricket is religion. So whether its the World Cup or the IPL, the game is sure to drive the nation crazy. A concept by Balraj KN
Socie-tee
Although most of their designs, including the ones titled as Pati Patni Aur Who, Taarikh pe Taarikh, Ramu Kaka ki Chai, Kolaveri and Mere Paas Maal hai have been hits among customers, one design that has risen to maximum popularity and has caught the fancy of many people, is a cartoon on Antilla, industrialist Mukesh Ambani's abode in the city.
"Antilla design was inspired by a popular cartoon made by famous cartoonist Dr Hemant Morparia. I had met Hemantbhai at an exhibition and pursued him to work with us. He is a great artist with superb sense of humour and his cartoons reflect current events happening in our country very well," says Rajveen of the multi-talented Morparia.
