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world2022/01/18

We're Heading To Los Angeles!

by Wolf & Badger

Following a year of significant growth and demonstration of love for independent brands from our West coast community we are excited to share that our New York and London stores will now have a sunny counterpart in... Los Angeles! 

We are bringing Wolf & Badger to Melrose Avenue, West Hollywood, giving our California-based customers and brands a new home to come and discover more about the world of Wolf & Badger and help in our mission to connect people across the world with the best independent brands. 

Stay tuned for our Spring/Summer 2022 launch but in the meantime find out about the artist behind our West Hollywood store facade. 

We've partnered with illustrator, designer and artist, Matt Munday to create our vibrant store vinyls, adding some extra sunshine to the streets of Los Angeles. Matt is a London-based creative, inspired by the joy in life's simple moments and his love of music, movement and disco to create exuberant, expressive illustrations. We caught up with Matt to find out more about his creative process. 

What are the stages of your creative process, taking the initial idea to a finished piece?

It varies from project to project, but I always like to build a moodboard with colour palettes based on the initial brief and from there, roughly sketch out my first thoughts and ideas on paper. Once I have a good collection of basic drawings I then refine those sketches a little more digitally, adding structure to placement and dimensions. Finally, I will illustrate each element separately and play around with colour before adding them to the final artwork. 

Movement, dance, disco and everyday moments play a prominent role in your illustrations. How did the pandemic affect your relationship to your work?

It’s funny, because although I love the busyness of London, you never really get a minute to slow down, stop and take a minute for yourself or assess where you are at. The pandemic and working from home really allowed me that time to refine my handwriting to a point where I was really happy with what I was producing. Of course not being out and about was tough, but I drew on a lot of past experiences and self initiated projects to keep me motivated. I also had a lot of encouragement from my partner who always champions my work. 

How do you hope people will react or feel when viewing your work? Is there anything in particular you hope viewers will think about? 

I want people viewing my work to feel a sense of happiness, joy, and playfulness. I try not to take life too seriously, it should be fun and being able to portray my personality and outlook on life in my work is very important to me. Even with topics such as climate change and sustainability which are pretty heavy and important topics at the moment, I feel that you can still make something joyful and upbeat whilst sending a powerful message. 

Your work is characterised by an exuberant, vibrant approach to colour. Is there a specific influence behind your expressive colour palette?

From a young age I was heavily influenced by Keith Haring, his strong and direct mark making matched with the bright colour palette intrigued and inspired me. It is a love that I think you can see translated in my work today. 

I also take huge inspiration from dance floors and festivals, the decor and music play a huge part but it is the partygoers outfits that I always love. People seem to have a lot more freedom to be who they really want and aren’t shackled by their home lives, jobs or problems. You can be whoever you want on a dance floor and nobody will judge you. 

Discover our selection of LA-based designers below: