My good friend brought me yesterday to Mortimer Snodgrass in Old Montreal, where he showed me a T-shirt company that takes packaging to another level.

T-box from Istanbul compresses T-shirts and other apparel into tiny boxes the size of a palm. The only hitch is that you don’t know how the tee fits and can’t return it if it turns out to be the wrong size. But it’s a cool concept nonetheless.

Labelled as Montreal’s urban operator, MadeinMtl culls the best places for fashion, booze and poutine, one of Quebec’s “delicacy”.

The site also features vignettes, narrated mostly in French, on themes germane to the city’s character like the Underground City, the Montreal stairways, multiculturalism and Cinema L’Amour. I strongly recommend a visit (the MadeinMtl site of course).

Tech evangelist Guy Kawasaki offers a peek into the whimsical world of Threadless. I’m sure working long hours takes a different meaning at their funky corporate digs.

We’re re-releasing Vinyl House. A few changes on this edition: the tee’s in white, the list of names have been reduced and re-arranged (unfortunately we had to drop the Germans and the Spaniards), and the font is slightly heavier.

Each loop in the vinyl contains names of DJs arranged by country. We did it this way as we find it easier to recognise that the T-shirt’s about house music - Antoine, Bob, David, Joachim should be a dead giveaway.

For those who are not well versed in house music, here are the DJs we pay a tribute to:

France: Antoine Clamaran, Bob Sinclar, David Guetta, Joachim Garraud, Laurent (Garnier, Pautrat, Wolf), Martin Solveig.

UK: Carl Cox, Chris Lake, Dave (Armstrong, Seaman, Spoon), John Digweed, Nic Fanciulli, Mylo, Pete Tong, Seamus Haji.

US: Armand Van Helden, Dennis Ferrer, Erick Morillo, Felix Da Housecat, Robbie Rivera, Roger Sanchez.

the Netherlands: Fedde Le Grand, Laidback Luke, Martijn Ten Velden, Peter Gelderblom, Rene Amesz, Sander Kleinenberg.

Sweden: Axwell, Eric Prydz, Henrik B, Sebastian Ingrosso, Steve Angello.

Support the artists and buy their music!

PS: We’d like to thank the members of the David Guetta forum for their contribution in making this T-shirt.

A couple of clips today. The first is another rendition of the Tecktonik rage in France, this time gal showing her male counterpart, how electronic music is danced.

As for the second one, it’s just not what you’d expect to see when people breakdance.

Like any big city, New York has its fair share of high street shops. But if you go south of 14th street, tons of hip, independent stores are waiting to be discovered. Here are some of the cool places that I saw:

Uniqlo

The “Japanese American Apparel”, Uniqlo has made New York home to its flagship store - a towering repository of colourful, mass-produced items. The design of the retail space is quite impressive, but I wish I could say the same about the T-shirts.

Sure, Terry Richardson, one of the world’s most coveted photographers, “designed” a whole T-shirt line for them, but it seems to me that the work was a result of a long 10 seconds of reflection: How about if I just stick a random photo on a tee? Maybe that’s what makes him a genius, but I just don’t get it.

Reed Space

The way I see it, Reed Space is what you get if Colette listened to hip-hop. A minimalist decor seeps through this Lower East Side Shop with streetwear magazines carefully arranged along the corridor and Graniph T-shirts neatly folded at the back.

Groupe 16 sur 20

With a Lotus Turbo Esprit parked at the entrance, this urban chic store is hard to miss. They didn’t carry many T-shirts (if any, can’t remember) but that car inside a shop thing was just too cool.

Roasting Plant

This was the coolest thing that I saw in NYC. Yup it’s a coffee shop but with one kick - the coffee beans are stored in tubes and, à la Willly Wonka, get sucked through the pipes all the way to the counter to give you that much needed caffeine jolt.

Addresses:
Groupe 16 sur 20: 267 Elizabeth St., NoLIta, website
Reed Space: 151 Orchard St., Lower East Side, website
Roasting Plant: 81 Orchard St., Lower East Side, website
Uniqlo: 546 Broadway, SoHo, website

Photo credit: Reed Space and me

Unfortunately for me, the title is to be taken literally. Hampered by a debilitating cold, I only got a glimpse of the exuberant NYC nightlife. But since all the good places in Manhattan are overrun by B&T folks at the weekend (like in London), that wasn’t a bad thing after all.

On Friday night, I probably had one of my swiftest night ever at a club. I arrived in the Lower East Side at about 1am and had the option to go to either Element or the Vault, two separate clubs housed in the same building.

I went with Vault, figuring that since it was located in the basement and the entrance was on a side street, it might be a bit more underground. Boy was I wrong. I left after 5 minutes, after seeing a group of a very young, college revellers dancing to uplifting progressive house. They seemed to have a good time, but it was too sappy and jolly for me.

On Saturday, I tried to stay in and get some much needed sleep. But after lying awake in bed for a good two hours, I decided to take a peek at the Sullivan Room in Greenwich Village. Fifteen minutes later (love the cabs in NYC - cheap, quick and easy to catch), I stood in front of the bouncer, exchanging the following words:

Bouncer: Who are you here with?
Me: No, I’m not on the guestlist.
Bouncer: Why are you here?
Me: For Mark Knight.
Bounce: You know who he is?
Me: Yes.
Bouncer: Ok

He was cool all along, but I thought him asking me “Why I was there” a bit unusual.

The Sullivan Room has the elements I like when I go out - a good atmosphere, people my age, not over-crowded, and best of all great tech house music by Mark Knight. Why do I like the dark, sensual beats? Because stuff like this happens (lots of dudes wearing T-shirts, ie: potential clients, in case you were distracted):

Lastly on Sunday evening, I decided to do the touristy thing and hopped on a boat cruise. But this “tour” was different from most others: Layo and Bushwacka, founders of The End, were at the decks for some cutting edge house music. A good way to end the weekend, and to get back to bed at a reasonable time.

ps: Although NYC is years behind London, Berlin, Madrid and even Montreal, for some serious underground action, I was told that Minimoo nights are by far the best ones in New York.

Photo credit: Sullivan Room and me.

Off to NYC until Monday night. Haven’t been there in three years. We’ll see after this weekend, whether I’ll still agree with New York Magazine that London has taken over New York’s reign as THE world’s capital.

Photo credit: Tcritic.

Retracing the origins of trance, this clip, filmed in 1993, also reveals how Berlin became the capital of cutting edge music. Featuring interviews with Dr Motte, Paul van Dyk and Laurent Garnier .

Via Resident Advisor.

Montreal has become a hotbed for electronic music in North America. Two major events are taking place later this month - Mutek and Piknic Eletronik.

A smaller version of Sonar, Mutek is a week long feast of electronic music and digital imagery. The big draw in this year’s lineup has to be Gui Boratto and Michael Mayer, who sometimes spins for free at T Bar, from Cologne-based label Kompakt.

Piknic Electronik is quite an interesting concept. It’s an all day music fest opened to families and children, at Parc Jean-Drapeau, the former site of Expo 67, whose goal is to democratise electronic music. Glad someone out there cares about our future. Maybe we should start working on our kids line.