so you’re “raised by wolves” eh…?

that’s generally the question i get whenever i rock my rbw x sam bat coaches jacket. haha it’s pretty damn funny, but to certain degree, i have been “raised by wolves” as i’ve grown with the brand over the last 4/5 years of my life. anyhow in this post, i wanted to talk a bit about all the work that the boys with raised by wolves have done and how i’ve been super lucky to have these dudes as some of my best friends.

pete, calum and i, with our respective girlfriends in 2007.

so it all started my first summer in canada (2005ish), right before i started university. i skated in a contest in stittsville where i came third place. i think jay hyland and paul britton at the time finished 1st and 2nd haha. but the raised by wolves boys (calum and peter), who were “roflcopter” at the time were super sick and hooked me up with a few threads and stickers. so after that contest, i emailed them and we just started hanging out with them a whole bunch, going skating, drinking and snowboarding.

roflcopter was kind of a joke brand, but really got the chains greased on what would become raised by wolves! anyhow, during that first year of university, i met my good homie, dan pulv (who’s getting married in september), who introduced pete, calum and i to the world of nike dunks and the whole “hype” side of things back in the day haha. we started following and posting in the forums for hypebeast that year and peter inadvertently was asked to start blogging with them. before we all knew it, peter became the internet sensation that he is today, as sort of a superstar blogger for highsnobiety and the whole titel media family.

here’s peter and i, in new york, circa 2006 interviewing sean reverand of rockers nyc for hypebeast at the time.

pete’s ongoing run has been nothing short of incredible! he’s a very well traveled man, and the strong business and global perspective that he’s been able to offer as a friend has been huge to the development of not only the brand, but how we all approach things as individuals (hopefully that doesn’t sound too cheesy, but it’s true). he’s definitely helped me out with some work internationally (*as seen below). in terms of the brand, he’s definitely produced some really rad ideas as well as connecting with some amazing designers and shops, but with his unparalleled knowledge of the industry, he’s also steered the brand to the amazing direction that it’s followed in the last few years.

here’s a feature from highsnobiety print mag, of trent matley i shot for converse. it ended up running all across europe last year!

and you know what they say, “no man succeeds without a good woman behind him.” i’ve known pete’s dedicated girlfriend katherine just as long as i’ve known the two boys. kat or as i like to call her, kazzerine, has been there every step of the way and is running her own little blog, “lil snob” under the titel media brand as well haha. she currently runs most of the shipping and logistical side behind rbw.

kat at some lobster dinner i had last year at my crib. (photo via cleo s.p)

the other crutch to the brand, is no other than our boy, calum green. cal has always been a relatively strong individual and i think he’s definitely the main work horse behind the brand, who’s pulled through with designs and manufacturing year-after-year, collection-after-collection. it’s inspiring to talk to this dude and you can definitely see and feel the fire in his eyes everytime you get a chance to sit down with him.

so this is apparently the very first photo i have in facebook, circa 2006, cal green, popping my collar! haha and claire farley is in the mix too! haha

after having lived most of his adult life, here in ottawa, just this friday, cal moved to montreal, where both pete and kat currently reside. over the last 2/3 years, cal and i have definitely grown closer and i consider this dude one of my best friends. as the brands grown, my photography also started to take off in the skateboarding world. not trying to be pinned to any particular style of photography, i’ve been lucky enough to team up with pete, kat and cal to have worked on the lookbooks and product shots over the last several years. haha here are some of my favourites from various years in no particular order…

just recently, we worked on the new and really well received Aqua Design Capsule Collection! this shoot was really fun. with the focus being on the water camo fabric, we chose 3 different water environments complimenting the 3 colors, blue, green and brown. we chose three models with matching eye colors and it was on! we shot this all in a week and it was all sort of magical! lindsay lachance (brown), marie hoekstra (green) and sarah godding (blue) were incredible!

anyhow i was originally going to just post photos of the new collection that we worked on together, but i figured i wanted to tell a good story haha (one that many have asked over the years anyhow).

to add to all this, raised by wolves has grown huge over the last few years straight from the grassroots to having close to 5000 followers on facebook (that’s like a big deal these days!). they’re selling to over 40 retailers world wide, with production being something like 800% greater than what it was even compared to seasons past. without a doubt, i am super fortunate to have amazing homies like these, doing their thing! as they’re now all living in montreal and have a very solid workflow in effect, there’s no doubt that this well oiled machine will become one of canada’s premiere brands! i honestly can’t wait to see where we all go from here! the future is golden haha. i guess i’ll be making many more trips out to montreal.

check it all out at: http://www.raisedbywolves.ca/