SHEIN stole my artwork

The Rundown

I figured that as my brand grew, I would eventually get some of my art stolen, but not suddenly from a big company like SHEIN. This is somewhat old news already but it will forever be relevant as long as fast fashion companies like SHEIN continue to steal art from small creators with absolutely no respect. 

In May 2021, a follower informed me that SHEIN had a t-shirt with a frog on it from my LINE sticker series Oh my Frog! which has somehow become somewhat prolific on the internet without my knowledge, and of course without any attribution to me. This particular shirt had been reviewed over 300 times, with photo evidence in the reviews that real people had bought (and loved) the design. Even selling for a mere 10 CAD per shirt, that meant SHEIN had raked over 3000 CAD in sales for just this one stolen piece of art. It still enrages me. 

I tweeted @SHEIN right away and despite the enormous amount of engagement (for me at least), they failed to respond. It took another kind follower of mine to @ them on one of their own tweets for them to reply. By the way, I also had emailed them through their oddly specific copyright notice page that my copyright had been violated, and they never responded. 

A simple sorry is in no way respecting a designer, especially without any form of compensation at all. I appreciate they took the listing down, but in a sense that is just erasing evidence of them stealing art, and letting them move on to their next victim. If they truly respected intellectual property, surely they would not continue to do this, and remove all previous instances of stolen artwork. In my humble opinion, they have no moral compass.

I have no enlightening knowledge to impart on you other than heavily advertised companies with suspicious low prices are not to be trusted. A large company stealing a design from another large company is one thing, but stealing from a small designer who has very little power to protect themselves is the lowest of the low. 

I'm making shirts in retaliation

Out of literally pure spite and because many people have expressed their love for this design, I'm making buff frog shirt of my own which you can pre-order here! 

Unlike SHEIN, where the shiny spots on the frog were black, they will be white to make sure he looks EXTRA shiny. I can guarantee the quality of the artwork will be better as well since it will be at the full quality, and I've also redrawn him to make sure he's looking fresh as possible. Please consider supporting me if you like my work! I doubt I can reach SHEIN's 300+ orders but even a fraction of that would be great.