A shirt with words on it has a guest list. It cannot come to the office on a day with a client in it. It cannot come to your partner's parents' house the first time. It should not come to a photograph you will still be looking at in fifteen years, because in fifteen years the line will have aged and your face will not have changed enough to carry it.
A shirt with a picture on it goes everywhere. Nobody has to read it, nobody stands slightly too close working out where the sentence ends, and it never announces an opinion you had not planned to hold that day. Ten of ours below with nothing written on them at all, sorted by what they show and who tends to reach for them.
The rangefinder
The Camera T-Shirt is a single film camera in clean line art on black, drawn accurately enough that people who know cameras will start naming the body. It is the design here that behaves most like a lapel pin: small, specific, and completely silent about it. Good for the person still shooting film, and good for the one who has a shelf of cameras they no longer use and cannot part with.
The record
The Record T-Shirt is a vinyl record rendered close up on sport grey, groove by groove, so it reads as a circle from across the street and as a record at conversational distance. Music shirts are usually band shirts, which commit you to an opinion for the whole day. This one commits you to nothing except the format, which is a much easier thing to wear on a Tuesday.
The typewriter
The Typewriter T-Shirt puts a full typewriter in detailed line work on navy heather, keys and carriage and all. There is a whole category of gift for writers that consists of quotations about writing, and most writers find that excruciating. An object instead of a sentence is the better move. It sits well under a cardigan, which is where this shirt is going to spend most of its life.
The balloon over a mountain range
The Hot Air Balloon T-Shirt sets a hot air balloon drifting over rugged peaks on dark heather, in muted tones that keep a busy image calm. It is the most storybook design in this list and the one that photographs best, oddly, because the composition has an actual foreground and background. Buy it for a traveller, or for somebody whose flat is decorated in maps.
The 1950s coupe
The 1950's Classic Car T-Shirt is an American coupe from the middle of the century, chrome and body detailed in fine line on black. It is a car shirt with no flames, no lightning bolts and no text, which narrows the field considerably. It suits the person who goes to the local show and looks under the bonnets, and it is a safe pick for a father-in-law you do not know well.
The diving helmet
The Diving T-Shirt is a Mark V helmet on dark heather, drawn as an object rather than as an adventure. It is the most unusual thing in this list, half maritime history and half steampunk, and it gets asked about more than anything else here. Good for a diver, good for anybody with a thing about shipwrecks, and it works as a plain dark shirt from any distance over ten feet.
The lighthouse
The Lighthouse T-Shirt puts a weathered lighthouse on a stormy coast on heather navy, colours pulled down to sea greys and blues. It is the closest thing here to a landscape, and it belongs to the person who takes their holidays somewhere cold with a good pub. Navy on navy keeps it subtle, so it reads as texture until somebody looks properly.
The lunar cycle
The Moon Phases T-Shirt lays the phases of the moon out as minimal line art on black, evenly spaced, more diagram than decoration. It is the design in this list that works hardest as an everyday shirt, because at a glance it is a row of shapes. Good for the person with an interest in the sky, and equally good for somebody who just likes a clean graphic.
The roller skate
The Roller Skate T-Shirt is a single retro skate in bright flat colour on white, purely graphic, with the seventies rink palette intact. It is the loudest thing in this list and the most fun, and it belongs to the person who actually goes to a rink on a Wednesday rather than to somebody borrowing the aesthetic. White base, so treat it the way you treat any white shirt at a party.
The sunset over water
The Ocean T-Shirt is a retro sunset silhouette on dark heather, in the flat banded colour that seventies and eighties surf design did so well. It is the design people buy when they want the feeling of a place rather than the name of one, which is why it does not say California anywhere on it. Wears easily, goes with denim, and looks correct in July and in January.
The practical part. Every design is original artwork on soft cotton, cut unisex S-2XL unless a product page says otherwise, at $32. Shipping is free over $75. Everything is fulfilled in the US and Canada, so nothing gets held for duties. Dark heather and navy hold fine line work best, which is worth knowing when you are choosing between two of these for the same person.
All ten come from the Signature Collection, which is where most of the picture-led designs sit. For landscapes, animals and botanicals in the same register, browse Nature and Art, and for the older, plate-and-specimen end of the catalogue there is Vintage and Antique Illustration along with a longer guide to vintage illustration shirts.