bape

Bathing Ape and Nintendo team up, offer gloriously unaffordable clothing

Bathing Ape, or Bape for short, is a Japanese street-wear clothing company owned by music producer Nigo that caters to young, fashion-savvy urban youth who apparently have way too much money to burn. A couple months ago, the company collaborated with Nintendo to create an exclusive (and subsequently, very rare) Nintendo DS($167) bedazzled with Mario and the now famous BAPE logo.

Now they're releasing a line of T-shirts and fleece sweatshirts for their fans who just can't get enough of high-priced gear. The "Mario to Milo" series will feature Nintendo's classic Italian plumber and … Read more

Head Porter showcases fall iPhone cases

Tokyo-based fashion designers Head Porter come prepared for the holiday season with a new collection of cases designed to fit both the original iPhone and the 3G. With a long history of catering to the fashion-forward tech consumer, Head Porter offers stylish cases for cell phones and mp3 players. This fall's iPhone collection sees the marriage between a new case form and classic Head Porter visuals, including "Black Beauty," "Monogram Black Beauty," "Dot Black Beauty," "Master Navy," "Navy Argyle," "Python," "Savanna," and "Zebra." … Read more

Understanding branding and viral marketing with A Bathing Ape

The best examples of corporate and product branding are usually found in consumer goods--companies like Apple, Coke, Nike etc. provide the rest of us with models to follow and relate to software. A great example in the fashion world is A Bathing Ape, a brand obsessively built and managed by Nigo and profiled on Portfolio.com. Back in 2001 I went to Japan and become semi-obsessed with the A Bathing Ape (BAPE) brand. Every hipster kid had a cool BAPE t-shirt or hat and I just had to have one. We finally found the store in Harajuku where the line … Read more