Urban Outfitters Rips Designer’s Cupcake T-Shirt

Online vendor Johnny Cupcakes sells t-shirts and other clothing for hipsters festooned with cupcakes. (A notion we entirely support, being given to a particular love for the tiny cakes.) Apparently Urban Outfitters asked Johnny Cupcakes for a few samples of his t-shirts to be considered for placement in their stores, something that would have certainly had great financial reward for both companies. Sadly, Urban Outfitters chose not to carry Johnny Cupcake’s products—or he chose not to go with them for some reason; we’re not sure—and never returned his samples.

Now it would appear that Urban Outfitters has copped his design remaking an extremely similar t-shirt under the ‘Urban Renewal’ brand. Johnny’s original is on the left, the ripoff is on the right. Granted, the whole ‘dropping a bomb of x’ concept isn’t really new, but if Urban Outfitters solicited t-shirts from a designer, they shouldn’t be getting anywhere near the same concept if they choose not to license the artist’s work.

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