Aplomb Clothing

If you have too many issues with authority to hold down a traditional job, your employment options are generally limited to rock star, international bounty hunter, or carnie, because everyone knows carnies answer to no one. Or, you could slap your surliness on to gear, like Aplomb.

Hatched by a corporate dropout with an admitted “bad attitude” and his RISD-schooled partner, Arlington-based Aplomb aggressively applies a Gonzo aesthetic to DC themes with their line of 20+ super-soft cotton t’s, hoodies, and fitteds. Overtly political designs include “Green is Good”, with a tree inside a dollar bill inside a recycling symbol; “Wiretap”, with stylized soundwaves and equipment; “K-Street”, with X’d out suits fronting the Capitol and a silhouetted streetwalker featured prominently in the foreground; and “Truth”: a cartoonish skeleton banging on a podium under the flag, either a scathing commentary on America’s bellicose executive office, or a ringing endorsement of “Skeletor 2012″. Less brazen but still arresting are “Halftone”, with a DC flag replacing the “O” in “Aplomb”; “Birds Eye” with a stylized overhead shot of the grid around Dupont/Logan; and “Skyline”, with a photo-negative shot of a Capitol Hill side-street, most likely taken from a helicopter, which in turn was most likely pursuing a guy who also thinks green is very good, and will sell it to you.

Because t-shirts can’t hold credit cards, Aplomb’s also just dropped a fully embossed, black- and red- leather, Jacob’s ladder-style “magic” wallet that flips open two ways, a perfect prop for your next free-spirited job: a-hole street magician!

Peep their online store immediately