OUR STORY

Dogstar clothing is the result of a Halloween costume that got way out of hand. In case you don't know, Halloween is a very important holiday in San Francisco - not that we need an excuse to dress up. We'd just adopted Paco, a long-coat chihuahua, from a blind man who was having a hard time taking care of him and his brother, Pepe. Paco most likely knew it was time to find a new family, so one day in Dolores Park, he trotted over and became our friend. The bond was immediate.

Onto Halloween: inspired by the Mission district surroundings I grew up around and this dog's ethnic heritage, I decided to make him a chili pepper "hot dog" suit, complete with red dingle balls. I'd seen plenty of cutesy-wutesy dog outfits that made me want to hurl, so I took a different approach, drawing upon my childhood surf/skate/hot rod culture obsessions with Hot Wheels, Ed "Big Daddy" Roth and his "Rat Fink" comics character. Aesthetics aside, the design concept was to create an outfit that was comfortable for active dogs to play and rest in, easy for owners to put on and take off and a suit that would also function as a harness.

Paco's outfit turned out to be a complete hit. Friends, family and complete strangers convinced me to make a business out of it - and I was gullable enough to listen - so the result is what you see here. Dogstar, made by hand, locally, with love and giggles, from the best materials we can find. We donate partial proceeds from every sale to pet rescue, and are taking steps to make our production processes more sustainable. Have a look and email us if you'd like to rock your dog with one of our designs.

Enjoy,

Christian Schneider

p.s. we're co-producing a pet-rescue benefit show in SF on December 13th, so if you'd like to volunteer, donate or attend, click the Wags to Riches picture up above for more info. See you there!