Hands down, one of my favorite shops is the The Ryde. I grew up in SoCal and spent more than my fair share of time hangin in HB. The hand-drawn surf-styled tees of The Ryde couldn’t capture it any better. Couple picks for this post are the Foam T-Shirt - love the Gray on Black. And a bit of a variation on the riding theme - the Moto Tee. It’s got a cool graphite hand drawn look to it, even though it’s photo. Check em out at TheRyde.com

I’ve think found my latest favorite shop. The Ryde, out of Laguna Beach, CA. As you can imagine anybody calling SoCal home is likely to be influenced by the beach scene. The Ryde has some surf themed stuff with a nice feel. Plus a number of very funny one liner style tees. And they do a great job with both. I’ve picked a couple of favorites here, The Pirate shirt and the Wheat Girls wave graphic. I’ve got one of the black pirate ship shirts myself and I love the subtly of¬† gray on black. Great print job and soft as can be.

I’ve been meaning to get around to post on T-Post for a while. The concept is very cool. T-Post is a subscription based t-shirt shop. You sort of sign up like you’re going to get a magazine, and instead you get a t-shirt once a month (six weeks actually). The conept behind the shirt designs themselves is even more unique.

Each shirt design is based on a current news item. Information on the topic of each month’s shirt is then printed on the inside under the tag. The subscription runs $32 (USD) a month and includes shipping. T-Post is based in Sweden and prints on American Apparel tees. You can stop your subscription at anytime you like.

For real t-shirt fans who are really into t-shirt culture this is a very cool way to insure you get cutting edge, unique tees that the guy next door is definitely not going to have.

La Fraise is a French based store with a great looking site and even better looking designer graphic tees. Browse in French or English and you’ll find some cool tees like the Moneyvice tee (left) or Cheval de trois II. La Fraise uses Spreadshirt for fulfillment, but looks to have a completely custom shopping cart system in place. Really nicely done and with some shirts.

Seeing as how the holiday shopping season is upon us I thought I’d put together a few Christmas / Winter themed designer tees. The first couple come to us from Design You Can Wear (DYCW). Simple and bold winter graphics without being too cheesy. Women’s long sleeve snow flake shirt is $25.99. The men’s winter moose shirt is $19.99 The polar bear shirt is a favorite and comes from Threadless, which is selling it now for only $10. Great deal.

Our unknowing designer t-shirt model of the day is actor Don Cheadle, shot here at the recent Happy Feet premiere. Our t-shirt designer is Marc Ecko. For those unfamiliar with Ecko’s work he started out as a graffiti artist in New York. We’ll make the long story short and tell you he ended up designing t-shirts among other things. It’s actually a pretty cool story and a great example of how something as small as a t-shirt can launch a career into a ton of different directions. Check out Marc Ecko’s corporate site here, or Ecko Unlimited for a ton of related designerly stuff.

Tee Party Tees is a new site with some cooler designer-like vintage retro kinda, sorta shirts. Biuld on the Spreadshirt platform it’s a good lookin site with some nice offerings. We’ve posted a couple here.¬† I dig the recycled cassette shirt and especially the Sighting shirts. For the gals I like the In the Stars design (posted here), and the Geisha shirt is nice too. Give em a look. Time to start your holiday shopping.

I love the illustrations on Blowout Clothings tees. Beautiful stuff. All of the design work seems to integrate the name, which really makes the brand part of the actual design and more than just the name on the shop. The philosophical connotations of the name are obvious and it works well as a force behind the design. Once again Spreadshirt serves as the backend, which means good shirts and reliable delivery. Check em out.

Here’s a couple of nice designer bits from Moda Chick Apparel. I like the one shoulder tee with the Chinese Opera design. The pump shirt is great too. Another good looking Spreadshirt store with a custom front door on it. Nice shirts with a feminie designer spin.