For Writers & Editors
Sunrev is a small-batch label from the morning side of Honolulu. Every design begins as a drawing in the woodcut tradition — a tarot card, a sun bird, a goddess in the waves — figures the water kept offering until a pen could follow them. We work the way that tradition forced people to work: one color, hard edges, nothing to hide behind. Each mark is printed in black, here in Honolulu, onto heavyweight white blanks, and released in small numbered batches counted by hand. When a batch sells through, that mark rests and a new one goes on the table. No limited editions, no countdowns — just the practice.
“Every shirt is a print first.”
“We don't do limited editions. We do batches — the next mark is always being drawn.”
“One color. Hard edges. Nothing to hide behind.”
“We draw in a tradition that had no undo. We kept the discipline.”
Sunrev's five marks are original drawings — figures taken from mornings on the water around Oʻahu, drawn by our own hands in the woodcut tradition. They are not traditional Hawaiian iconography, and we do not present or sell them as such. Hawaiʻi's moʻolelo belong to the people who carry them. If you write about us, we ask you to keep that distinction as carefully as we try to.
On method, we are equally plain: we design by hand and print by machine — direct-to-garment, in black, in Honolulu. We do not carve blocks, and nothing here should be described as hand-pulled or hand-printed.
All images courtesy Sunrev, Honolulu. Please credit as such.