Levi's Photo Workshop

Last night I went to the launch of the Levi's Photo Workshop. If you haven't heard of the Levi's Workshops yet, they aim to encourage and foster the creative spirit as part of their current Go Forth campaign. The first one was in San Francisco in July, and it was a printmaking workshop. Very happy that the one to hit New York was about photography! The whole thing was put on by friends of Undercurrent Sub Rosa, and was held where Deitch Projects used to be at 18 Wooster.



Now, this party was a fantastic madhouse. It was one of the best vibes I've gotten from an event in a long time - probably all year. The music was great, the crowd was great, the drinks were great (thank you Skyy), and there was photography stuff EVERYWHERE. Light tables, vintage cameras for renting, tons of film and other goodies, photo booths, a machine that puts any photo you want onto a t-shirt, huge Macs with editing software, this place was hooked up. And lining the walls was a really great curation of photographs hand-picked by Tim Barber of tinyvices.com. You can buy supplies, take classes, go to panels, see rotating exhibits and just mess around with all of the goodies for almost the entire month year. I highly, highly recommend this thing if you live here and have even the slightest interest in photography. Seriously, there's something for everyone.









Out of the entire space and event, I don't think I saw a single piece of Levi's branding, which is just insane. Over the years I've seen the worst of the positive correlation between size of brand and how much control they want to have re: "make the logo bigger" syndrome. The most I saw were three little racks of jackets and shirts on the upper level. Very well done, guys.



Speaking of brands, the collaborators' list is nuts. Everything from Aperture Foundation to Leica and Kodak, Taschen and Vice. And there's a community partnership component, which supplies the warm fuzzies. A+ to Levi's, Sub Rosa and everyone else involved.

[More of my pictures here; see the Levi's Workshops pool here.]

EDIT 12 Oct | Marisa blogged about the workshop and event as well; if you're in the mood for more polished editorial (and some other shots courtesy of The Selvedge Yard), it's worth a read!