Hook-Ups T-shirt

Jeremy Klein put anime girls on skateboards back when that read as obsession, not strategy. A Birdhouse pro out of Torrance, he founded Hook-Ups in 1993 under the same Blitz Distribution roof as Tony Hawk's brand and gave it a single visual identity — Japanese-animation pin-ups and monsters, on decks, shirts and stickers; the company's 1994 debut video was titled Asian Goddess. Hook-Ups graphics became their own collecting lane, the bridge between skate shops and the anime aisle a decade before streetwear made that link official. This one is the house style at maximum sugar: a blue-pigtailed schoolgirl with a soft-serve cone in a yellow frame, the Hook-Ups logo hung like a candy-shop sign beside her. The garment itself testifies to its age: the collar tag is Tultex, the Martinsville, Virginia mill that went bankrupt at the end of 1999 and stopped production for good — so the blank, whatever day it was printed, left the factory no later than the turn of the millennium.

White short sleeve cotton tee with Hook-Ups graphic.

Sourcing
We source these shirts from thrift stores, estate sales, and directly from bootleg and overprint collectors.