Fifi LaBouche is my longtime queer apparel brand, creating bold, fun T-shirts since 2007 that celebrate LGBTQ+ culture with humor and heart.
I started Fifi LaBouche back in 2007 with a simple print-on-demand site, mostly just to make some fun, queer T-shirts that actually spoke my language. It was a low-pressure way to share ideas and make myself laugh without worrying too much about scale or sales. Then in 2013, things got a bit more serious when my then partner and I dove into hand-printing the designs ourselves on a six-color screen printer.
Screen printing turned out to be way more work than I ever expected. It’s a grind — hours of prepping, printing, washing screens, and repeat. But despite the labor, it was a creative rush and a blast to do it hands-on. The real highlight was taking our tees to Pride festivals as vendors, seeing people light up when they found something that felt made just for them. Those moments made every bit of the hard work worth it.
By 2015, we wrapped up the screen-printing side of the business, and I shifted Fifi LaBouche back to print-on-demand as a side project. It was less hands-on, but it kept the brand alive and the designs out in the world. Over the years, Fifi has remained a joyful space for me to experiment, play, and create loud, colorful queer apparel that’s unapologetically fun.
It’s never been about chasing trends or growing fast. Instead, Fifi LaBouche has been a steady creative outlet where I get to make work that celebrates queer culture in all its messy, joyful glory. Even now, it fits comfortably as part of Maxtana Creative — a reminder that sometimes the best projects are the ones you do just for the love of it, one T-shirt at a time.
