LONDON — “Logo mania — it is such a thing these days. So I kind of went for it,” said designer Matty Bovan, casting his eyes around the quaint London bookshop where his new ‘zine, Beautiful Teddy, launched on Thursday night.
Self-edited, self-published and brimming with references to his naïf, four-legged cat/pig logo, the ‘zine comes in a limited print run of 100 copies and is available at Donlon Books in Hackney, East London.
The magazine has multiple covers and looks at the origins of Bovan’s logo. “People ask what my logo is all the time. ‘Is it a cat? Is it a pig?’” said Bovan, who was twirling the ends of his braided hair and beaming at the small crowd of friends who had gathered at the bookshop to celebrate.
The ‘zine is split in two: The front features work by Lucy Alex Mac, a fellow Central Saint Martins alum and Rankin protégée. The back is filled with work by Bryony Walsh, a recent graduate of the University of Salford in Manchester, England. “We have four different covers, two by Lucy, two by Bryony. I love different covers — I can’t resist,” Bovan said.
Related Galleries
Shot in Salford, the images feature the designer and 15 models at the Caustic Coastal studios, all clad in clothing made by Bovan, such as a lace skirt embroidered with the word “crazy,” and a host of screen-printed and digital logos.
Bovan said he chose the title of the latest magazine because “Teddy is quite a universal word and it is quite cute, but it is also quite sweet and sickly in a way. It becomes almost like an icon, like a logo. I feel that a lot of my work is based on words that mean something to me or are universal.”
The designer has also launched an e-commerce site that sells screen-printed logo T-shirts, sweatshirts and stickers, with more products to come this summer.
Bovan had previously shown as a part of the Fashion East collective, and staged his first stand-alone London Fashion Week show in February 2018. When asked about his upcoming spring 2020 collection, the designer didn’t offer any details. “All I can say it is that it is my favorite yet.”