Looking For Something Different This Christmas?

Yes it's that time of year again, it is almot time to celebrate happy inoffensive non-denominational capitalist winter solstice gift giving day! Looking for something a little different for somone from Cambridge then check out our new shirts. The ideal something different for that certain special somone who you have no idea what to buy!

Firstly celebrate the unspoken pact of Romsey that can never be broken, if you were there you may discuss the events, but if you were not there, you get nothing. What happens over the bridge, stays over the bridge.



Then straight from one of Cambridge's most elite and exclusive seats of learning, let them know where they can get a real education with the classic Arbury University shirt.



And finally a Retro styled Romsey Town star shirt.



Have yourself a merry little time!

Mill Road Winter Fair 2010

It's that time of year again this saturday the 3rd of December is the annual Mill Road Winter Fair. They close a chunk of the road and a bit of Cambridge becomes pedestrianised and filled with arty and crafty fun.

To quote the official site:

"Mill Road Winter Fair is the essence of Mill Road distilled into a single day. Over 100 of the shops, cafés and restaurants open their doors and offer unusual dishes from their cultures, things which they might not usually ser...ve here in England. Talented local people from all over the world emerge from their homes with arts and crafts, performances, food, entertainments and a warm welcome in a day of general celebration."

Dr. Strangepunt or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Touts

ORIGINAL PHOTOGRAPHY: Rob Ellis MODEL: Liana

So according to our friends at the Cambridge Evening News the punt wars are back on but this year serious weaponry is being deployed. Those crafty punt pushers have deployed the most deadly weapon known to man and only gone and dropped the lady bomb.

As we stand on the brink of punt armegeddon, it's ten to doomsday, they're moving fast... heads up! Mind those boaters. No time to sleep, it's Def Con XX chromosome .

Some might think that in a university town as cosmopolitan and sophisticated as Cambridge sending pretty young belles in boaters down to the quayside to ply their wares might be seen as a little crass, mamas don't let your babies grow up to be punt touts, but many would say there is a long tradition of the daughters of the river god luring the unwary to the water with their enchanting music and voices.

Others may think however that as the old saying goes the female of the species is far deadlier than the male, if they want war they may just be about to get......

You Maniacs! You did it! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!

Recognition for Local Historian!

Here at Cambridge T-Shirts Allan Brigham is a bit of a hero to us, so it's nice to see him being recognised by Cambridge University this week with the award of an honoury Master of Arts degree!

Honoury degrees usually upset me, what with a real degree these days costing students three years of their life and up to £20,000 by the time tuition fees and living costs are taken into account, it seems particularly offensive to devalue this by awarding some reality TV star a degree just for having a perma tan and half a personality. You get so used to reading about universities awarding honoury qualifications to people who don't particularly seem to deserve any kind of honour that to see someone being honoured who actually knows what he is talking about, contributes to the local community and seems to be a genuinely nice bloke deserves celebrating!

You can read more at the Cambridge Evening news site here and the BBC actually has some footage of an interview with Allen here.

If you have never been on one of Allan's tours then we would thoroughly recommend it. You can find out more here.

If you are too lazy to actually get out of the house then you can also order the book Bringing it all back home half of which was written by Allan and provides some fascinating insights into how the Romsey area of the city developed.

Go on help celebrate a local hero!

Town Not Gown? Gown Not Town?

So it's the 36th Cambridge beer festival this week, the oldest continuously running beer festival in the country and the second largest beer festival outside London. A festival of beards, tankards, cheese, pork pies, morris dancing and last but not least murky pints of old head stomper, badger botherer, stoat fancier and whatever other whimsical names have been attached to the alcoholic weapons of head destruction they have on offer this year.

Although I'm a lager man at heart I always like to head down for a spot of people watching, some quality cheese and and a few pints of worryingly strong continental "biers".

Every year the festival has an theme, this years is Town and Gown a subject close to our hearts at Cambridge T-Shirts. They have carrried this motif to the beer glasses.. The gown one shows the character drinking beer with a mortarboard, playing cricket and rugby, and with a spade. The locals one shows the mascot drinking beer. Is this a metaphor for student life? Who knows?

Anyway while we are on this subject it seems like an appropriate opportunity to recomend you abotu a couple of our choice local T-Shirts:

For those of you of a Town persuasion we have this lovely little beauty where you can proudly declare your allegiance to Town Not Gown.

For those of you on the other side of Reality Checkpoint we proudly present this other tasty T-Shirty morsal allowing you to proudly tell people you are Gown Not Town

The only way is up Castle Hill....

Cambridge, for those of you unfamiliar with local geography, is flat, like pancake flat, flatest, flatmost, flatfull in fact. This is great for cycling and I'm sure part of what makes Cambridge such a cycle city. Once in a while though you can have enough flat and start to crave lumpiness, bumpiness and all things upwards pointing. Pretty much your only choice for what passes for a vertiginous ascent in these parts is the Castle Hill. It's called Castle hill because it used to have a Castle on it, though these days you would be hard pressed to really notice any crenellated evidence to prove it.


In Anglo Saxon times there was apparently a settlement on Castle Hill. As the high ground around these parts you could see anyone coming from miles away and then do whatever Castley things were on your mind, shout insults, throw stuff, you know.

When the Normans turned up around 1068 they built their own castle there, apparently if you go North in a straight line there is no higher ground until you reach the North pole! Though how anyone knows this stuff you do have to wonder, every time I watch that Tony Robinson and his time team I'm torn between thinking it's pretty cool and the fact they could tell me anything and thanks to my pitiful lack of knowledge I wouldn't be able to disagree. You could tell me the King of Sandwich build a magnificent bready castle from loaves, cheese and ham to protect the magical celery forest and, while I may think you are talking toilet, I would actually be fairly hard pressed to disagree on any kind of factual basis.


When I get right down to it there are only three facts I can quote with relative certainty:

1) There is a hill.
2) There is no Castle.
3) It is called Castle Hill.

Still several historically accurate and vital facts short of a prize winning round on Mastermind I tend to think. Though possibly enough riveting facts to get me a guest spot on breakfast television.

Which is quite shameful, a all time low to match Cambridge's all time high. In celebration of reaching not only the very literal peak of Cambridge but also this metaphorical peak of ignorance join us at Cambridge T-Shirts with this special T-Shirt to celebrate our conquest of these great heights.

Go on reach for the stars!

The Cambridge Dark Arts......

Imagine my suprise on reading a survey by Varsity which reveals that 49% per cent of Cambridge students in their own words have committed "some form of plagiaristic act" whilst at the University and they are not just talking about the derth of new material in recent years footlights reviews! Boom, Boom! I thank you!

"Sometimes when I am really fed up, I Google the essay title, copy everything onto a blank word document and jiggle the order a bit" a Cambridge student explains in the article that I have copied directly and jiggled about a bit.

It would appear the University is full of cheaters! The most shocking discovery for me was that the department with the highest percentage of cheaters was Law with 62% of them admitting to breaking the university rules! 62%! Sixty-two! SIXTY TWO PERCENT! That means there are actually 38% of lawyers who are honest! Or alternatively not confident enough of their own ability to believe they could get away with it......

Still, every cloud has a silver lining and while this sounds like particularly bad news for Cambridge University, it sounds like great news for Cambridge T-Shirts! If the statistics are right this means there is a much larger market for our cheery pirate of academia T-Shirts than we previously thought.... that is assuming they don't just copy them....

Look out honey, cause I'm using technology....

Those of you who subscribe to this blog may remember us talking about new print technology back in July. The people who print the shirts for the Cambridge T-Shirts site are introducing something called Digital Direct which allows printing straight onto shirts.

This allows us to put more colour and detail onto the shirt while still giving you a hard wearing and long lasting design.

Unfortunately the technology is currently still being tested so we can't put it in the main shop yet, but we have just taken delivery of a sample shirt printed to test the colours and print quality and we got sooooo excited we thought we would share.

So here are some pictures of the first sample for your perusal, check out the lovely crispy colours on a fresh October day in Cambridge :)

If you can't wait to get you hands on some Cambridge based produce you can always check out the Cambridge T-Shirts site and see what products and designs we have available right now.

Free Shipping 16th to the 30th of September

Until the 30th of September, Cambridge T-Shirts is offering free shipping on all orders, yes all orders, crikey! All you need to do is simply enter the following code during the order

SHIPFORFREE

and we will send the order with free shipping. You can check out our products here and remember you can always design your own Cambridge t-shirts here.

Now on to the usual legal yada-yada offer ends September the 30th, you can only use one voucher per order. Cannot be combined with other discounts. Never eat more than you can lift. Never hit a man with glasses. Use your fist. Just because it's toxic doesn't mean it's not tasty. The complete lack of evidence is the surest sign that the conspiracy is working. You need only two tools for life. WD-40 and duct tape. If it doesn't move and it should, use WD-40. If it moves and shouldn't, use the tape. And last but not least two rules for life: (1) Don't tell people everything you know. (2) ....

Start your engines......

Just mentioning "Mitchams Corner" is enough to prick up the ears of any racing enthusiast. The annual 24 hour urban rally is famous as one of the most mythical races in the world. It unusually takes place on open public roads, with no official timing or prizes for reaching check points first. In fact, with very little point to its very existence, it is by definition one of the last pure sporting events, held solely out of sheer boredom and obviously for the tremendous honour of taking part.

Since 1923 famous manufacturers such as Diashatzu, Toyboata, Volks Wankin, Peugoat, Renfault, Porch, BlandRover, Mercedes Bends, Mitsabitchi and Laguar have taken part and contributed to writing the Mitchams Corner legend. A legend founded on an egalitarian belief that no competitor willing or unwilling should be excluded and unique in allowing both the unwary motorist and cyclist to unwittingly take part.

This exceptional circuit (one of the shortest in the world) bathes in an aura created by the most renowned manufacturers and the greatest drivers in motor sport.

The 24 Hours feels like it lasts a whole week, starting with scrutineering, the peering the prodding, poking and disapproving, followed by practice, then on and on to the penultimate drivers' parade through the centre of Mitchams Corner. Then comes the magic of the race, which continues all through the night.

During the rally, some participants have been fined for speeding and other traffic offences by the police as they passed through, cars have been confiscated and in 2007 the rally was cancelled after the contestants decided they really couldn't be bothered and parked up at the Portland for the night.

It's a breathtaking event, low performance cars thundering down the straight at well under 30 mph, spectators gripped by the suspect nature of this human and technical challenge... experienced drivers pushing back the limits of tedium...

Let yourself be wrapped up, carried away, guided and seduced... Endurance IS Mitchams Corner...

My Day In The City, It's Not Very Pretty

Now don't get me wrong I love adverts, British advertising at it's best can be funny and thought provoking while still trying to persuade you that the answer to your woes is to spark up a cheap cigar and that the opposite sex will genuinely find you more attractive if you smell like a professional footballer or his anorexic wife. Unfortunately the local buses in Cambridge are adorned with some of the most nauseating, shallow, tacky and intelligence insulting adverts I have seen in a long time. It would not be so bad if they were monuments to local heroes like the inventors of DNA or Disco Kenny, but it seems that making it entertain us, say something about us or to us is obviously below the advertising geniuses behind this campaign.

With a blandly smooth picture that's at least six foot in height (if local rumours are to be believed these were bought on the cheap on a computer disc of clip art!) these nuggets of arsepirational 'lifestyle' ordure encrust our council sponsored local transport in a desperate attempt to pimp the notion that it's not just losers who get the bus. These larger than life, emetically hip and upbeat profiles of the smug bourgeoisie leer down down at the gridlocked traffic as they vainly try to impress you with their narcissistic boasts of going to improbable places while doing unlikely things, like some nightmare blind date with some kind of satanic accountant who tries to steal your very soul whilst simultaneously attempting to get into your pants and explain the intricacies of triple entry bookkeeping. They seem to miss the point that I, like a substantial proportion of other local people aching to jump the green band wagon, only embrace the 'citilife' when there's not a lot of other choice. It's not aspirational it's the transport of last resort, but it shouldn't be this way! When I was a student 'ooop north' the local council sunk vast wheelbarrows of folding wedge into the local public transport infrastructure and it was a funky bus lane a go-go wonderland of affordable magic carpets that would whisk you from one side of the city with no mess, no fuss, just a council funded bus. Cambridge by contrast appears to have one of the most enthusiastically half arsed public transport policies I have ever encountered, bus lanes start, then mysteriously end just as they get to a congested piece of road, they get narrower, wider, mingle with cycle lanes and have their surfaces decorated in increasingly lurid shades or orange, you can only assume they form some part of some ritualistic message to the old gods that only makes sense from outer space.

It would be laughable if you had not actually had to stand repeatedly on the outskirts of the city for an hour and a half as the the horizontal rain whips in off the fens and in to any exposed opening in your clothing and body, waiting for the bus that might just arrive in time to get you back to work for tomorrow.

There can be nothing more dispiriting than watching eight consecutive, brightly liveried, mobile billboards trundle past on their way to neverland, or at least never to return land.

As the greatest poet of our generation said "It says nothing to me about my life" and it's about time it did, so why not tell people exactly what it has really been like by wrapping your self in one of these beauties, your shirt, your words, your real day in the city!

Busted!

"The macho elite Cambridge University Top Don school for advanced fellows and tutors was established to select the best Academics and develop, refine and teach them tactics and techniques The Academics selected to attend are considered to be the best of the best.... I feel the need..... The need for tweed...."

Or at least that's how the advertising fluff on the Cambridge T-Shirts web site used to read..... until I got an email reading:

"We're concerned that there is a possibility your designs are copyright protected by a third party."

Which, ignoring the initial human urge to disagree, you can see their point... especially as that was pretty much the whole motivation behind the T-Shirt, the very idea that there might theoretically be an "elite Cambridge University Top Don school" made me giggle. Plus lets be honest with the seeming constant academic one-upmanship and even wikipedia recognising the concept of the Superdon, it didn't even seem that far fetched.

Still I have no particular desire to be banged up for copyright crimes so I guess it's back to the drawing board, rest assured the top don will re-appear, if for no other reason than the design for the back of the T-shirt is just too good to waste....

What Cambridge Needs Is A Monorail

Everyone who lives in Cambridge knows it is is approaching gridlock. The council is busy wasting our money on the misguided bus, a classic example of group think, to provide an impractical service that won't solve the problem, it's dangerous with a potential to have spectacular collisions with cars, bicycles, and pedestrians, it will be hideously expensive and won't actually make anything better! It's too little too late.

Monorails have evolved over time to become an incredibly safe and efficient transportation choice used all over the world. A 12.8 km monorail opened in Naha, Japan in 2003 with 15 stations. There is also a 27 km, 29 station monorail line currently under construction in Jakarta, Indonesia!

Monorails NEED to be incorporated into a regional transport system. Anyone with any idea of creating transportation that "Really served" the community can see what an essential role a monorail would play, 100,000s of commuters could be moved daily at rapid speed and to all the local areas. Over time more lines could be added

Every right thinking person knows what the the real answer is! Elevated rail is inherently cheaper than tunnels and safer than the alternatives, obviously commuters will benefit from a choice of leaving their cars and riding a monorail, the fiscal logic is so compelling, yet resisted by the powers-that-be, SOMEONE has to be making money off the more expensive alternative. Who?

Drum Roll Please....

Yes celebration and cake all round or something.... we have a new site.... a splinter site if you will.... full of Cambridgy goodness and local things for local people, you want niche product you've got it!

There are currently t-shirts for Arbury, Cherry-Hinton, Coleridge, Cottenham, Market, Newnham, Petersfield and Romsey with more coming soon!

Unique designs from in and around Cambridge City in the UK, you won't find these T-Shirts anywhere else! We only use quality brand name products and all printing is done using a special plotting technique that gives a very high quality durable print where the colours don't fade. Whereverer possible we offer organic and fair trade versions of our products. Is that hard enough sell for you? Don't make us beg come check it out!

The Romsey Triangle

The Romsey Triangle has long been full of mysteries. The vast three sided segment of Cambridge in the UK, bordered by Abbey, Petersfield and Coleridge has had many names.

However it didn't acquire its most famous nickname until 1964, when my uncle Dave went out for a few pints only to awake a full 48 hours later with all of his money missing and his trousers gone without a trace. No natural explanation could be found.

Is it an area where the normal laws of physics simply don't apply? Could, under the surface, lie an ancient and mythical city? Are alien forces at work? Might it just be all one giant hoax or is a government cover-up in operation? Limbo of the Lost. The Twilight Zone. The Hoodoo Town. The Devil's Triangle. The answer is still a secret only known to the Romsey Triangle.

Welcome to Reality Checkpoint!

So new product at last, a real local shirt for local people! Marking the mid-point between town and gown the Reality Checkpoint stands proud in the middle of Parker's Piece. It's been a Cambridge landmark since the early 1970s. The name comes from an unofficial inscription which first painted on the lamp post (allegedly) by students from CCAT (now Anglia Ruskin University) under the guidance of one of their teachers.

Whether it really marks the boundary between the 'reality bubble' and the 'real world' or just because it forms a useful landmark for drunk, befuddled or fog bound, it is the only light for hundreds of yards and makes me smile every time I pass on my way home!

Show it some love and check the new shirts out here.