ALEX VARGAS ‘VERTIGO’ MERCH

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Creator Studio was a global “on demand” merch business created by the H&M group, which offered creators and brands services to manage and grow their merch business. During my time there I had the pleasure to design for a lot of different brands and artists.

alexvargas.com/merch
The album on Spotify

ALEX VARGAS ‘VERTIGO’ MERCH

Graphic Design
Print Design

Alex Vargas wanted merch for his new album Vertigo that he could sell directly to fans through his own Shopify store. Photography, typography and the design for the album were already finished, so the task was to translate an existing visual language into products people would actually want to wear.

The collaboration was also new. The team wanted to partner with Creator Studio, and see whether it could grow into something long term. Creator Studio’s in-house design, in this case me, took on the design work, and everything had to line up with the album release.

They were open to different ideas as long as everything stayed within its graphics and style. The challenge was keeping the design cohesive across three garments, t-shirts, hoodies and tote bags, without the layouts drifting apart.

Since the artwork was already locked, there was no guidance on how it should work on merchandise. I let the red square speak for itself on the front, at pocket size, so it’s visible without shouting. On the back I placed artwork I designed myself. Creator Studio has specific size parameters for back prints, so I used the full area for the best legibility.

Red and beige were the primary colors across all prints. Red was the main complement on black hoodies and white t-shirts, while beige was used on the the black t-shirt as an alternative option.

The concept landed well from the start, so only a few feedback rounds were needed. I presented a playful, a minimalist and a combined version. The client wanted elements from both the playful and the minimalist, so we built a new combined version together.

All three garments were approved, but the tote bag was left out of their own web store. The t-shirt and hoodie are live in the store today.

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Gabriel Palma

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