Art & Inspiration Roach Studios Artists?

Everyone knows that Robert Williams, Ed Newton, Franco, Johnny Ace, and other's worked for Roth doing design's,...Stanley Mouse did his own...but who was doing all the Roach Studios design's?

 

Well good ole Ed Newton was there! Also designed the awesome "Roach Coach" for them.
Quote from Dec.2000 Hot Rod Magizine article about him By Newt: about hooking up with them in 1971: "At First they wanted me to freelance their shirt design work.I did 30 or 40 designs for them before they talked me into being Creative Director for the operation." he appeared on their '75 catalog cover with the completed Roach Coach. He then took a 2 year hiatus in '75 to open a gallery in NYC, but returned to work for them in '77.Ownership of all his Roach designs eluded him.They folded ...he's STILL designing cars.

 

I don't know exactly what he did, but Gary Mizar worked with Roth for 12 or 13 years.

 

my question is what happened to all those cool designs from the 70s that roach had.someone has got to have the artwork/rights........I'd love to come up with some Roach designed shirts again..........

 

Yeah, I thought alot of those Roach designs looked like Newt's work...

 

The Roach car designs were all conceived in detail by Newt and then turned over to their very talented staff of commercial artists (not car guys) for the final versions. Designs began as line art stats, which were then hand airbrushed with frisket technique.

I sat in on all quarterly design sessions held at the office in Columbus for the period '80-82, when I had a consulting contract with them. I contributed several of my own designs as a part of that agreement during that time. Robert Williams and Bill Copeland freelanced a few during that period.

Some of the company's assets were sold off and some were purchased by a new company, Airwaves, started by former Roach principal Stan Petersen. I'm not certain where the bulk of the art wound up, but Stan did give me a couple of my originals back when that happened. The only "car guy" commercial artist at Roach, Chris Mullen, is now an Airwaves co-owner. Kevin Simpson, the other owner, started out as a sixteen year old selling shirts from the Roach trailer at the Indy Nationals in the 60's.

 

Is the "Wild Bill" Copeland the airbrush guy.he was fantastic........wish I could find airbrush guy like him in the southwest

 

With all the retro shirt companies these days (Old Glory for example) I'm suprised nobody has picked up on the rights to all the 70's iron-on artwork and re-released them.

Not just the car - related stuff either. Some of the political and social (drug) statement designs were awesome in their anti-PC-ness. Lol.

I'll take a couple of the Zig-Zag man shirts, size XXl tall. Thanks.

 

In the old days, no one worried about copyrights and just printed anything. In the last few years, GM and other car companies have sued shirt printers for using their "copyrighted sheet metal" designs.

Even the old Zig Zag man shirts were copyright violations. You'd think Zig Zag would be smart enough to market shirts themselves because I would agree...there's a market there.

 

Hmmm.doe´s not like a gasser on your avatar?
do u have one?
want to see it. pleese

 

Here are a few shirts from my colleciton, I have a big collection of Ed Newton work.

 

in the 70s I wrote Roach a letter and they let us use this chevelle freak art work for our club jacket..............

 

I came across 2 roach iron ons still in the package. one is a chopper with a chopper dude on it, could be a Newt design, I beleive it says "choppers inc" on it. the other one is Raggedy Anne.

 

I took these photos of Bill Copeland at the 1979 World of Wheels

 

does anybody still do "wild BIll" Copeland type shirts,he did some for me and Id love go get a couple more done

 

Last I knew, Bill Copeland was still operating his sign shop in Yucaipa, CA. Been a while, though.

 

Great Post, keep them coming......................

 

Would love to find a place to see or buy the t-shirts/art work from Roach Studios. Anyone have any links?

 

Great Stuff...gonna have to dig through some of my old tee shirts now

 

I seem to remember as a kid waiting for the bus, reading a catalogue of shirts. Some I remember were the turtle humping the Army helmet, the Keep on Truckin' dude, various monster / car shirts, and the cat in a bottle with "Happiness is a tight pussy" under it. I was too little to understand that one in grade school!
Was that a Roach catalogue, or who was it? They had some cool stuff

 

Bringing this back up for a little more activity....

 

I found this on ebay, a Roach iron on and Bill Copeland design

 

I remember 1959, sixteen year's old,sent my money,(cash in an envelope) to Roth the Crazy Painter. Slauson Blvd , Maywood Ca. recieved an actual airbrushed "Irrestible Beast" T-shirt

My mother wouldnt let me wear it to school.

Wish i still had it.

 

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Beside Roth, Mouse, and Roach there was Redina studio located here in the Westside of Detroit located at 14408 Plymouth Rd. Big Daddy Kats was the "artist" for this wierdo shirt maker. Was looking at a Rod and Custom from 62 and they had an ad for shirts and stickers. Anyone ever hear of them?

 

I used to buy the baseball card size stickers with the stale bubble gum inside... One of the stickers I remember was the "Vitamin Z" yellow '68 Z/28 Camaro with the black stripes.... Wish I had the iron-on of it......

 

Dave Mann had some great Roach designs as well.

 

this guy 's ears must be burning ..... roach studios just joined the forum today at 4:30 this morning ... son of one of the original guys .. just backed up to let him know that you guys were looking ...