Staple Design = A Positive Social Contagion

Undoubtedly the most inspiring person we met at Buffet was Jeff Ng (jeffstaple) founder of Staple Clothing, Reed Space and Staple Design. The second forum at Buffet included a presentation by Jeff who delved into the story of his early beginnings in the mid 90’s as a uni student breaking into the silk screen lab to print a pillowcase full of tees, to accidentally landing an order for 12 tees by walking into a prominent New York store ‘Triple Five Soul’ boutique.

As I began to take in his words, the taste of direction and faith started to reiterate that ‘anything is possible.’ Not to say that lady luck played a major role in the Staple story, but the long hours he put in eventually paid off. He hustled to fulfil orders of tees (at one stage it got to 1000 units from a Japanese buyer) late at night at the silk-screen lab, and studying for his university degree during the day, to a part-time job (driven by his need for fly kicks) and free lancing as a graphic artist. I was scratching my head wondering if this machine knew what sleep was? It was these foundations that i realised that everything that paved the way was ingredients for a positive future.

His social collaborations also started showing how the dots began to connect for jeffstaple. The new millennium witnessed the opening of his own retail store ‘Reed Space’. Together with ‘Staple Design’ he began doing work for Rawkus Records designing CD covers for their recording artists Mos Def and Talib Kweli (as Blackstar), Common, to then working for Fader Magazine which eventually flew him to Japan to do a story on the exclusive Japanese Nike quick-strike releases. This lead to the Pigeon Dunks which came out in 2005 with only 200 pairs - things got crazy!… check out this video which made front page news.

His communication through Staple Design coupled with his initiative to nourish his fellow artists (exhibition in Reed Space) caught the interest of large companys looking for the right avenues of expressiveness that would connect with their customers eg. Nike Burton Snowboards, Converse, HBO, Levi’s, New Balance, Puma and Timberland, just to name a few he offered his services to. As his Positive Social Contagion continues to spread into this new decade, i asked Jeff where he sees himself in five years time… Catching him off-guard he answered by saying (along the lines of) that he would like to see his company operate in a manner where he could spend more time enjoying the better things in life, travelling, meeting new people and staying challenged. In a way he’s on the right track, participating at Buffet and dropping a staple diet of street knowledge that you can’t find in any recipe book. As this all digested in, ironically i was not full but more hungry. A hunger to make more of what we have at DS and to use this energy to strive for bigger and better things. So stayed tuned…

This is a massive thank you to jeffstaple from the DS team for breaking bread with us and serving up a square meal of streetwear science.