Several months ago Threadless announced its first ever Bestee Awards, the winners of which were declared this morning. The awards were to go to exceptional designs, contributors, and community members with categories ranging from Design of the Year to Overall Achievement in Blogging. How awesome is that?

Here comes my part in the affair. The Threadless Select line is a subset of the Threadless line curated by a fellow named Upso. It showcases multiple-design winners and designers or designs that might not otherwise be voted into existence. I knew Upso as a talented illustrator, designer, and publisher of Faesthetic Magazine with a discerning eye for good work and good people and was very excited when asked if I could contribute a design. I’d had a concept cooking in my noggin for quite a while that I was eager to get to work on.

When my Select tee, Medusa (seen above and available for purchase here), was released some weeks later, I was flattered by the critical praise from my peers. The exposure on Threadless was tantamount to that received with my appearances on Drawn!, Design is Kinky, Coroflot’s Featured Portfolio, and other prominent sites. It was really great for both my career and my wardrobe, heh!

When the Bestees were announced, I noticed that there were one or two categories I might have a shot at. About two months ago, I went freelance full time. I’ve had less time to post to forums and, in turn, Threadless. I thought the Bestees came and went. When I checked my email this morning and was greeted by a message with the subject line “Congratulations! You have won a Threadless Bestee!”, I was totally floored! The announcement came entirely out of left field for me.

I’m happy to say that I won the Threadless Bestee Award for Select of the Year! Woo!

In addition to the monetary award of $5000, there’s a really awesome award statue designed by Dan Ballin and Joe Suta! Frankly, I’m terribly excited to put this on my desk!

I’d like to thank Upso for offering me a chance at a Select, the Threadless staff (from the guys stuffing the packages on up), the members of the Black Rock Collective and Stylus for all their advice and friendship, the Threadless community at large for tolerating my ridiculously long blog posts, and, well Medusa for being one hell of a saucy gorgon!

Lastly, here’s a video Threadless put together announcing the winners:

Threadless Bestee Awards Recap from cshimala on Vimeo.

I’ve got a truckload of work at the moment. Several tee designs, a few branding/lettering assignments, a children’s book - the list goes on. I took a quick brake the other day to do a logo for a friend’s softball team. I only spent about forty minutes on it, but I think it’s worth posting!