American Apparel and Sesame Street Collaborate on Line of T-shirts

Oct 8, 2009

Los Angeles-based American Apparel announced the launch of an exciting partnership with Sesame Street to produce a limited-edition run of classic T-shirts. Commemorating the 40th anniversary of Sesame Street this fall, the new line will feature a handful of Jim Henson's most compelling characters printed as their original line drawings on American Apparel garments.

Sesame Street, educating children in more than 120 countries, approached American Apparel earlier this year with the show's entire catalog of graphics. The two companies immediately connected over the different but passionate ideologies that drive them and set about working together.

"We sat down and went through eight discs of artwork from the Sesame Street archive and picked the ones we responded to the most,” said Carolina Crespo, a graphic designer at American Apparel. “It took almost two months, but the end result is a cast of characters and images that bring a modern feel to Sesame Street and a heritage to American Apparel."

Drawings of the various Sesame Street characters were translated into line illustrations and printed on the dozens of bright colors of American Apparel t-shirts. The first four prints selected span the 1960s, 70s, 80s and 90s, and range from individual characters like Big Bird to a picture of nearly the entire cast.

The line, which is set for release this month, will be sold in 25 American Apparel stores worldwide, including locations in New York, Los Angeles, Tokyo and Berlin, as well as online. With the recent relaunch and expansion of the American Apparel Kids' line, the companies hope to translate the same classic images into kids' sizes.