Get Funky with Hawaiian Clothing

I started this post with the mindset of posting some cool looking pictures of people, mainly men, looking 'funky' while wearing some cool tropical clothing similar to the Hawaiian shirts we offer on the Wave Shoppe web store. SO I went to Google images and started searching for some appropriate images.

I was a bit taken back by the flood of images that didn't contain anything more than a picture of a lone Hawaiian shirt. And before you say it, I don't consider someone wearing ill fitting clothing with a tropical print as funky. Actually I think many of these people they refer to as "models" are fashion disasters, but that's a post for another day.

4 funky monkeys at a Luau

So as I paged through the shirt images I finally came across something 'funky'. While it wasn't exactly what I was looking for, it was close enough. At least someone was creative enough to dress up their monkey in Hawaiian garb, hence transforming them into funky monkeys. So a tip of my beachcomber hat to the person that dreamed up the funky monkey luau setting.

Diane Kruger

But all is not lost! The ladies save the day with tis picture of Diane Kruger wearing a blue Hawaiian shirt with a simple black skirt.

Diane looks very nice, as well as looking funky. I should mention that while we don't offer this exact print on our website, we do offer a nice selection of womens Hawaiian shirts that are sure to please, as well as add a little funk to your life.

Automobile Threads

It's pretty common to place a design or embroidered logo on a shirt to shows ones affiliation to a company or brand. But when you have a obsession for vehicles, such as automobiles, you go all out and get a shirt that looks like a billboard ad for your favorite auto. 

While we have certainly seen our share of t-shirts with a full spectrum of automotive themes, from my personal favorite, which were the shirts with big daddy Ed Roth's Rat Fink rat rods, to almost every make and model of classic car, its probably been put on a t-shirt.

But equally popular with the car crowd are Hawaiian shirts with cars which are adorned with everything from woody cars, to hot rods such as 5-widow ford coupes. While t-shirts are predominantly white, a Hawaiian shirt with automobiles can come in a myriad of colorways. White, blue and green are very popular colors with automobile enthusiasts.

Fontana Speedway wearing Wave Shoppe's white woody car Hawaiian shirts

 

Wave Shoppe's which are designed and manufactured in Hawaii. That particular shirt boasts a red woody car parked on a palm tree lined beach.

The designs and color combinations available are only limited by your imagination. Many of the Hawaiian car shirts contain secondary themes such a 50s diners, cruise nights, and of course imaginary beach themes. Ha, most of the classic cars I have seen at car shows would get stuck in the sand, so many designs are just pure fantasy.

One thing I have not seen on Hawaiian shirting as of yet are the expensive late model cars such as Cadillac SRX parked on the beach or a Cadillac CTX or the Audi A8 L W12 cruising town, but its possible that those cars and many others could actually make it into a Hawaiian shirt in the next 20 years or so. I mentioned Cadillac because at some point in our future the 55 Chevy's are going to step aside and those Cadillac models are going to become the new "classic Chevys".

And take note that shirts emblazoned with cars are not just for the guys, as you can see in the picture above, the are a lot of women working at the speedway and they wear all sorts of shirts with automobiles when they are at work.

AAARRRRGGGGHHHHH Parrots!

Parrots! I seem to be surrounded by them at work and at home. At the Wave Shoppe Hawaiian Shirt store in Escondido we sell Hawaiian shirts, muumuus, tropical dresses, tropical signs and we have some really cool, colorful parrot wind chimes among other things. The parrot wind chime sound is a tinkling of wood and really quite soothing and that is about the only soothing parrot I have ever heard.  

For some unknown reason I allowed my husband to talk me into getting an Umbrella Cockatoo. Anyone who knows me knows that I have always had a fear of birds. This stemmed from being attacked as a child by a giant macaw when I was 5 years old. I simply walked by this birds’ cage while playing with my friend and this bird jumped me and while he didn’t do any physical damage I was pretty scared and simply preferred to stay away from birds. Don’t get me wrong when I saw birds I did not freak out and run or anything embarrassing like that I just preferred to stay away from them especially parrots.

One day my husband told me he had found a reputable breeder who had a baby cockatoo and could we just go look at it? He said a baby cockatoo would be small and getting it small would enable me to grow comfortable with it by the time it was full grown so we headed out to just “look”. I didn’t find out until later that Charles had been to the bank the day before and funnily enough he had just the right amount of cash to buy that parrot in his wallet. By the way we adopted the bird and named him Coco and he was not small.


Baby Cockatoos are really big about the size of 6 canaries all together and they are expensive!!!!! Lifetime commitment as they live longer than humans do. They are messy, destructive, annoying attention grabbers but when they are loving and sweet they make up for all the negatives. My parrot sits on my shoulder and runs his claw through my hair giving me what my husband terms “googly eyes” he says he will have a problem with the bird when it begins to sing me Barry White songs!

So for all you parrot lovers out there. We invite you to hop in your car and take a drive to Downtown Escondido to come check out our wooden parrot chimes!

The chimes are only available in-store but they are really colorful and look good in patio areas, bars and poolside.

On the left is an actual picture of one of the parrot chimes we offer in the showroom.

And of course we have lots of Hawaiian shirts with parrots in an array of colors. One of our most popular parrot shirts are these orange Hawaiian shirts with parrots and we sell this particular shirt year round.

What color is your favorite Hawaiian Shirt?

One of the best things about owning a Hawaiian tropical shirts & apparel company is that you get to pick out the prints that we offer to customers.  Charles and I have always had a little competition going on because as we both poll our customers to find out their favorite prints and colors we both feel we know what will be a best seller and what could be a fizzle.

Recently we stocked a new print that Charles designed and we worked hard to make sure the color was perfect we did this print in a navy blue and royal purple. Charles was only going to put the purple in the womens Hawaiian shirts and muumuus but I wanted to put it in the men’s print too. So I bet him that men would buy the purple shirt too. He thought that men would not like the purple shirt but would buy the blue one instead. 

Well long story short we put the blue and the purple Hawaiian shirts for men on the rack and within 30 minutes a man came in and said “Wow this is a beautiful shirt” he bought it right there and then. I didn’t want to be infantile and say “ I told you so!” but I just couldn’t help it J 

I have to hand it to my hubs though he does have a keen sense of color and he is a very good designer and makes some really beautiful prints. So what color is your favorite for a Hawaiian shirt? Would you wear purple? 

 

 

Travel Info for Your Hawaii Vacation

Aloha everyone, with warm weather and summer fast approaching, it time to start thinking about summer vacations, as well as getting into the planning stages for some luaus. But we also know that those are not always simple tasks and that people may need ideas or basic advise.

So having said that, we thought that we would share some of our favorite vacation and travel articles/references with you. Yes, some of the sites are ad supported (we get a few cents if a visitor clicks on an ad), but the information contained on the sites we are suggesting could prove to be pretty invaluable to many people.

So first up in our favorites list is Travelers Frequently Asked Questions About Traveling to Hawaii  posted on Island Shirts. The page offers information on airports and flight travel as well as tips in eating, what to wear and so on. 

Next on our list is an article from Shop Hawaiian containing Recommendations on stores and businesses to shop at in Hawaii and smart shoppers know that personalized shopping recommendations are the way to go. Also on our virtual itinerary is the website Shop Aloha where you can Learn more about Hawaii's Culture and Lifestyle, its always good to have some basic knowledge of the culture, and that applies to just about any new location you visit.

Now onto our favorite part of summer, that being PARTIES! Yes, we live for them. But again many people are at a loss and do not even know where to start. And of course we are going to hook you up; let’s start with How to Decorate for a Luau where you can learn from someone’s first hand experiences. The writings cover everything you need to know about luau decorations and more.

And as an added bonus for our valued readers we offer you tips on How to Dress for a Luau which is a must read for the party planners as your guests will all be asking you what’s appropriate luau wear and what’s not.

Factually speaking, the most commonly questions asked still, and for some seamingly odd reason always will, pertain to What to wear in Hawaii and we think that it’s because most people simply want to fit in and in a way pay respect to the Hawaiian culture. If you consider yourself to be a really geeky Hawaiian apparel person you may enjoy an lengthy yet detailed article authored by Linda Boynton Arthur, titled History of Hawaiian Holoku (Hawaiian dresses). We hope this helps you have a more enjoyable summer and if you have a resource you would like to share simply mention it in a comment and we will check it out. Mahalo everyone!

Thomas Jefferson died on July 4th

I don’t know about you, but I find it hard to believe that the 4th of July is a little over a week away. I mean what happened to April, May and most of June? There’s even a month long gap in my Blog posts, maybe I have lost track of time or maybe it’s just that I have not had much to say, probably the latter. I was thinking that I might research and write about Hawaiian Independence Day, but I think I will save that for a later post.

For most people the 4th of July means a long weekend, fireworks and lots of BBQ and increased alcohol consumption, for some that is. Myself I relish the patriotic displays but I also have a penchant for history and all the little mysteries that come with it, but don’t lump me in with the confused conspiracy theory people, ok.

So speaking of history… below are a few forgotten or little known facts about the 4th of July that you may not know, courtesy of wikipedia

‘Historians have long disputed whether Congress actually signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, even though Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin all later wrote that they had signed it on that day. Most historians have concluded that the Declaration was signed nearly a month after its adoption, on August 2, 1776, and not on July 4 as is commonly believed.

In a remarkable coincidence, both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, the only signers of the Declaration of Independence later to serve as Presidents of the United States, died on the same day: July 4, 1826, which was the 50th anniversary of the Declaration. Although not a signer of the Declaration of Independence, James Monroe, the Fifth President of the United States, died on July 4, 1831. Calvin Coolidge, the Thirtieth President, was born on July 4, 1872, and thus was the only President to be born on Independence Day’

I would also like to point out that if you’re a superstitious politician, the 4th may not be your luckiest day. Myself I think I am going to keep it simple, though I do have a nifty and quite loud fireworks shirt (shown below) that I am going to wear for the holiday weekend. I also have an additional patriotic shirt that I will be wearing that’s pretty cool but I don’t have a picture of it yet. Maybe I will add it later on, my wife picked out the design and I must say that she has excellent taste.

Before I forget, while Wave Shoppe offers a lot of unique Hawaiian shirts in the stores and on the Website, many of the shirts I wear are “one of a kind shirts’ which are not available for purchase.

Look at what's new at Wave Shoppe Hawaiian Shirts

Aloha to all our customers and ohana, we hope you are having a marvelous summer and eating loads of good grinds. This is the time of year that we are doing all we can do to keep up with orders for our lines of Hawaiian apparel, especially our line of Hawaiian shirts for men, which are made in the USA with the finest materials and craftsmanship available.

And then we have our Hawaiian store in San Diego, which carries the largest selection of Hawaiian apparel this side of the Hawaiian Islands. When you see all that’s behind this operation you cant help but wonder how we manage to keep it all together, we ask ourselves the same thing at times.

But the show must go on, including producing new and exciting designs. Without further ado we would like to offer you a preview of things to come.

First in the lineup is a design we call Maui Hawaiian shirts. This uniquely colored shirt has a black background with goldenrod colored plumeria and mango hibiscus flowers that really make the shirt pop.

While these mens shirts are not yet ready for distribution, but you may pre-order this shirt today from the Website.

We expect sewing to be completed by 8/18/2010 or sooner.

Next up is a beautiful Polynesian block print that we call Hilo Bay Hawaiian shirts which is a blend of Hawaiian nostalgia and Polynesian culture. Hmmm could that be a Tiki statue integrated into the design?

As with the Maui shirts, these mens shirts are not yet ready for distribution, but you may pre-order this shirt today from the Website.

We expect sewing to be completed by 8/18/2010 or sooner.

Well that’s it for now, keep an eye out for more exciting designs that will be released in the upcoming months. We are also near the end of our journey with an all new apparel design that will put this line far ahead of the pack. Pre-production garments will be distributed to our focus groups in the upcoming weeks, stay tuned!

Mahalo from the fine folks at Wave Shoppe Hawaiian Shirts

Happy Aloha Friday

Happy Aloha Friday everyone! Yep, Aloha Friday is my favorite day of the week, and a perfect excuse for all lovers of Hawaiian shirts to sport their favorite aloha wear for at least one day of the week. At the time of writing this I am thinking that I should be working on getting new products online, helping out at the San Diego Showroom, getting ready for the Friday night cruising Grand event (a 400+ classic car show where most participants wear car shirts that represent their automobiles), finalizing plans for the upcoming May 10th hula show etc. but to be honest I am just plain lazy today.

Maybe my laziness is attributed to the warm sunny weather and lack of supervision, I just don’t know and I really don’t care because its Aloha Friday. But then does anyone actually get much accomplished on Fridays?

Mahalo and happy Aloha Friday!

Escondido, California gets a dose of Hawaiian Tahitian Dancing

Aloha, towards the end of each year we try to do something momentous and this year is no exception. It became clear to us last year that our business is growing faster and larger than the current facilities can handle, which includes the additional 950 square feet we added onto our shipping operation. So the decision we made was to add even more square footage and open a retail showroom to showcase our Hawaiian wear.

While the business has already come out of the gate at a very fast pace, we thought that we would kick things up a notch by hosting a free Hula show. Also keep in mind that our showroom is located in the historic shopping district of Escondido, California. We sponsor a hula group out of Palomar College; Directed by Patriceann Mead, and in my own words, this Hula show was simply out of this world.

It was not long after we set up the speaker system that there was a run on Hawaiian shirts for men (even though leis and flower hairclips were also selling at a brisk pace).

The crowd of people soon started to gather in front of the storefront and it wasn’t long before the street was completely filled with onlookers and shopkeepers from some of the local businesses.

I mean there are not many men that can pass up watching beautiful Polynesian girls shaking their booty in public.

Im my opinion I had the best seat in the house, which was dead center of the stage.

But if you look at the picture of the fire knife dancer below, it appears that even Peggy (standing in the doorway) found a moment to enjoy the show while working in the store.

So you think this was a hula performance geared for men? No way dudes, we covered all the bases.

While this show was family friendly, we still managed to take care of the ladies fantasies with a fire knife dancer.

I wont name names but I recieved feedback from more than a few ladies that said they wouldnt mind helping with "putting his fire out" if you know what I mean.

While we took a few hundred pictures of the Hula show, it certainly isn’t feasible to post all of the hula girl pictures in a single blog post, so we hope you enjoyed the ones we have selected for you.

Mahalo!

Hawaiian Shirts Made with American Aloha

I started out with the intent of writing about why you should buy American made apparel and using an American flag image. But I decided that I would use the photo on the left because it is more disturbing (and it should be).

Believe it or not, in this day and age there are still many countries engaging in making apparel with child labor as well as operating adult sweat shops. This is usually an inherent property of developing countries such as India, Sri Lanka and Malaysia etc.

But we would guess that if you looked deep enough you would find some examples on the US mainland as well. The Fashion District in Los Angles comes to mind.

Apparel, such as Hawaiian shirts from Wave Shoppe are made in San Diego, California and Honolulu, Hawaii. In contrast, Tommy Bahama merchandise is actually manufactured in the Far East (China), though we are sure that they use labor compliant apparel companies for manufacturing. When you purchase Hawaiian shirts we would suggest that you purchase from a company that offers American made Hawaiian shirts. There is a good chance that the money you spend will be re-spent within our own economy and not used to stimulate some county you don’t live in.

For more information on these labor abuses we recomend visiting the Child Labor Coalition

How you can still buy American? MSN offers some good advice and you can visit sites such as Still Made In USA for listings of companies that offer American made products.

If you know of a great resource site that lists companies that sell American made products, please leave a comment with the URL to the site and there is a good chance that we will approve it.

Hawaiian Shirts, Cool Summer Clothing

Do you really think this “Hawaiian” look is so last season? Think again! Hawaiian shirts are a great way to make a unique summer fashion statement, especially if you’re going for that classic summer look with a pair of your favorite sunglasses, cargo shorts and and optional sandals. Hawaiian shirts are the perfect outdoor apparel to don for summer events like backyard parties and picnics at your favorite beach; Hawaiian print shirts lend a sort of colorful playfulness to any look and leave a lasting impression with all whom gaze upon you.

Bold, loud Hawaiian prints work best in this style, especially in 5-panel or allover floral print and Hawaiian pineapple shirts, which make for fun beach wear.

Cotton Hawaiian shirts are a good way to keep cool in the hot and frequently muggy summer months, whether at home or on the sands of Hawaii.

Imported polyester and other synthetic materials are an option when choosing material for shirts, but they do not breath well and you may find yourself feeling quite sticky in the summer heat. Cotton Hawaiian shirts are best.

Worn with a silly hat, board shorts, beach sandals (optional) and vintage sunglasses, Hawaiian shirts are an affordable way to stay in style as well as fill out your summer wardrobe. If your local Aloha shirt shop is only carries a limited supply of designs, check out some of the online stores, the patterns and colors are almost limitless and you can get some great on-line deals on this summer’s hottest Hawaiian apparel.