Image of God is a clothing line created by Justin Reed (J Reed or jayreed) with the purpose of spreading the word of God through the unique medium of hand painted clothing. Although Reed’s artistic endeavor to create hand-painted t-shirts and sweatshirts had begun years ago in the spring of 2006, it wasn’t until the summer of 2008 that the name of the clothing line, Image of God, became coupled with a theme to create clothing with a unified theme.
The Name
The quote, “Image of God,” in this context, is derived from the Book of Genesis Chapter 1 Verse 27, “God created Human beings in his own image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them both.” The name was chosen because of the various deeper implications behind this one verse. On the one hand the verse can be a reminder to everyone of their
beauty and worth in God’s eyes because we all are created in his likeness. On the other hand, it can assure us that God understand us on every level because not only are we created in his likeness, but also Jesus, came in our likeness. This verse can be a basis for why we are called to love one another and why we are all equal in God’s eyes.
The Message
The purpose of this clothing line is to make a statement. A person wearing Image of God clothing is making several statements:
• The uniqueness resulting from the meticulous process of hand-painting the designs, as well as the fact that the same combination of design scheme, scripture, and color fabric is never used twice, reflects the uniqueness of all the people on earth. No one wearing Image of God clothing
will ever run into someone wearing the exact same thing, just like you
will never find a person made just like you.
• The individual messages on articles of clothing make a statement, whether it is a call for us to love one another and maintain a bond of
peace or a call for us to act as soldiers that stay alert of the presence of evil.
• By bearing the scriptures written on this clothing, Christians wearing Image of God are able to make a statement in line with what Jesus says in the Book of
Matthew, Chapter 10, Verses 32 to 33:
"Whoever acknowledges me before men, I
will also acknowledge before my
Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I
will disown before my
father in heaven."
The Clothes
All Image of God designs are created with acrylic paint on t-shirts, hoodies, zip-hoodies, crew-neck sweatshirts, blazers, and other tops from such manufacturers as American Apparel, Hanes,
Bella, HYP, Anvil, Jerzees, and Great Republic, to name a few. In addition to a diversity of manufacturers, there is a diversity of designs, each of which is hand painted and unique; in addition, all articles include a Bible verse incorporated into the clothing. No two articles have the same combination of design scheme, article color, and Bible verse.
All clothing is pre-washed before it is sold so that any fading to the design and sizing changes
will occur before the customer’s purchase. Clothes should be washed inside out with the normal washing instructions and will not fade beyond the first washing.
The History.
In the spring of 2006, as a senior in high school, Reed, like most other students his age, contracted a condition known as “senioritis.” The condition is characterized by a loss of motivation toward schoolwork and
homework because all
work toward
college admission has been completed and the importance of high school classes seems to have lessened. At this time, Reed turned his energy toward what would be the earliest stages of Image of God.
Reed always had an interest in drawing and from that interest came the urge to find some way to put his own drawings on his clothing. Rather than use a silkscreen machine, Reed decided to choose a more unique path and began to cut out stencils for his designs. He would start by drawing the stencil on paper, then cutting out the stencil and spray painting the design on one of his old t-shirts. However, he realized that even though this method had the advantage of yielding crisp designs at times, it had several disadvantages including the fact that the flimsy paper stencils were not reusable. For a year, he used this method to put designs on his own clothing and also put designs on the blank clothes of
friends.
In the summer of 2007, Reed began to laminate his stencils before cutting them out, which solved the problem of non-reusable stencils and contributed to a much faster turn around time. Shortly thereafter, Reed started to order blank clothes in bulk and, thus, added the freedom of creating whatever designs came to mind on these high quality articles of clothing. While the laminated stencils and available blank clothing allowed for a speedy production to keep up with demand, there were still multiple disadvantages to his methods. For one, not all spray paint colors would turn out well on any color clothing, which greatly limited his creative abilities. A second problem was that to avoid the fumes and potential spray paint stains, work needed to be done outside, and, thus, was only limited to times when daylight and weather permitted. The biggest issue was that the need for stencils with spray paint greatly limited the designs that could be made because stencils are always a more simplified version of whatever design the artist may image.
In the spring of 2008, everything came together as Reed began to use acrylic paint with his designs. Reed was no longer constrained to using his stencils or working outdoors or only using certain colors. While the new hand-painted method required more time than the previous, the hours were well worth it because now the only limit to his designs was the fact that there is no eraser for paint. He could now create on a shirt anything he could draw on paper; and finally, his goal to be able to see his drawings on clothes was accomplished.
In the summer of 2008, a unified theme to the clothing was created in which all clothing would contain a Bible verse and, thus, spread the message of the word of God. And as a result, Image of God was established and a website was created to sell the clothing.
To date (August 2008), he has created over 150 items. Close to 90 of those items were before the unified theme of having Bible verses on all the items, which characterizes all of his clothing from here on out.