2nd Annual T-Shirt Design Challenge
About the T-Shirt Design Challenge
Accepting submissions until December 10th, 2025 | 12:00 PM (PST)
Theme: The State of US
This can be taken to mean the state of our global Gender Diverse community, or the state of the USA, or the state of the world. We’re open to interpretation! Designs must have some connection to the gender diverse community.
This design challenge is a playful and creative way to address the complex nature of gender and sex. We are excited to share this opportunity for one talented artist to create CAGD’s official 2024 T-shirt, which will serve as our main piece of merch for the 2025 - 2026 season! Additionally, we expect the shirt to encourage thoughtful conversation about the Transgender, Genderqueer, Intersex, and Non-binary + communities.
The winner will receive $100 and $1 per shirt sold for the rights to use the design they created for 1 year. Artist will also get a feature post on our Instagram sharing their artist bio, @, and images of their works, if desired.
We believe that art is a powerful and impactful way of reaching others in ways we may not have expected, and that includes clothing art.
How can we thoughtfully abstract our gender? What colors, shapes, objects, animals, letters, numbers, elements, etc. can be connected to our individual journeys as Trans, Genderqueer, Intersex, Nonbinary, Agender, and beyond? We want to see creativity! Artists are encouraged to think abstractly and outside the box.
Guidelines
Artwork must include:
- The year (written 2025 - 2026 or '25 - '26)
- Logo (provided in the design kit)
- Artwork this year is limited to black (#000000), white (#FFFFFF), and blue (#87B2FF).
The t-shirt itself should be black or white, with a preference for black but very open to options.
- Color layers must be able to be separated
- We use two fonts: Ahsing for our logo and headings and Cairo for all other text. Both are available on Canva. We leave room for other bold fonts to be used.
Allowed:
- Text/handwritten words
- Sleeve designs, back of shirt designs (we encourage this!)
- Multiple submissions - send us as many as you want!
Not allowed:
- Slurs (“Queer” is okay)
- Explicit or sexual material (nudity is okay, check if you have questions!)
- Characters including OC's
- Any manner of copyright infringement
Rules
By submitting a design the artist agrees to the following:
- In the event that your design is picked, the work will remain your property for use in any way, shape, or form except print on t-shirts, stickers, and tote bags for the duration of one (1) year, after which rights for the design are returned to you in their entirety; California Aggregation for Gender Diversity will have the sole right to sell and give away t-shirts with the design for one (1) year beginning December 15th.
- The artist will, in turn, be compensated $100 and $1 for every shirt sold for the use of their work during this period of time. The artist will also receive a social post as described above.
- Payment will be made by Paypal only.
- This challenge is only open to US residents 18 or older.
- Artist must be willing to fill out a w-9 form, if required.
- You grant us permission to post the design on our website, social media, emails, and any other digital or print media we may use to promote the work, with proper attribution to you.
- By submitting this work you agree that you hold ALL necessary rights and permissions and are able to grant us the use of the artwork for the purposes of t-shirt, sticker, and tote bag printing. You understand that if the work is found to be in violation of copyright law or any manner of artwork stealing, you will be fully responsible for any repercussions that may arise and will be barred from any future work with CAGD.
How it Works
Once all valid submissions are received, our board of directors will vote for the winning design in our December board meeting. The winner will be announced shortly following that meeting.
We’re excited to see what each of you comes up with!
About CAGD
California Aggregation for Gender Diversity is a nonprofit built to uplift our gender diverse community of Transgender, Genderqueer, Intersex, and Non-binary + individuals through mainly history and art programming. We are on our way to becoming the first museum and community space in North America entirely dedicated to our community.
Submit your artwork designs along with a bio, headshot, and artwork description in one email to: info@forgenderdiversity.org
We welcome you to reach out if you have any questions!
PS: If you’re an artist, archivist, or historian and you are interested in collaborating in other ways, please reach out with your ideas!