We’re calling it: this is the T-shirt of the 2017 election. Or rather this is Labour’s accidental, mysterious, unofficial merch success story, endorsed by neither the party nor Jeremy Corbyn himself, yet core to Labour’s social media campaign.

Designed by two friends and sold on their site, Bristol Street Wear, the £20 T-shirt features a mash-up of the Labour leader’s surname and the Nike swoosh. It was created just over a month ago and has since popped up at Corbyn rallies, last week’s Primavera festival and on social media; needless to say, it is sold out. Its glory moment came last weekend, when Grace Chatto of Clean Bandit wore hers while performing at the Manchester One Love concert only to have the logo blurred out by the BBC, presumably for threatening the station’s political impartiality, which led to a sudden Google spike in searches.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jeremy Corbyn on the £12.50 Labour T-shirts. Photograph: pr

BSW are anonymous – often standard practice when bootlegging logos copyrighted by multinational companies – but they agree to answer my questions with a series of gnomic, abstruse responses via email. They run the site, they say, from their local Wetherspoon. They call themselves “the interns”. They hate the establishment. They think Theresa May is “out of touch”. And they recognise that this could be a young people’s election, and that young people like sportswear.

So why has this particular T-shirt taken off? The design isn’t exactly pioneering: mash-up motifs have been around for a while. As have bootlegged T-shirts, which are easily available online thanks to specialist sites such as Sportsbanger and Bowlcut.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Corbyn x Nike mash-up T-shirt. Photograph: Bristol Street Wear

Nor is this the only T-shirt in an ever-growing pro-Corbyn-unofficial-T-shirt market. A cursory Google search shows about 12 tops, all perfectly wearable. Labour have their own, rather gentle ones, available at the socialist-friendly sum of £12.50, although Corbyn was voluntarily photographed with this one by artist Reuben Dangoor, which shows him dabbing. This one was inspired by Corbyn’s approval from the grime music community, while this one riffs on the Champion logo, which arguably adds a spring/summer 2017 twist to his campaign.

Being the home of Banksy, Bristol’s sense of politically charged creativity and anonymity comes with the territory. It is also hardly surprising that these “interns” might lean towards the pro-Corbyn electorate. A YouGov poll reckons that all four Bristol seats could be won by Labour. More than 60% of the area voted remain. And, while they’re aren’t ardent supporters of any party, they talk about the opposition’s leader with fondness: “Fuck knows if the establishment (including his party) will let him, but we’re sure fucked if we don’t give a guy like him the chance.” They add: “[Corbyn] seems to be a genuine bloke who really wants to sort out as many issues as he can.”

Steve Coogan, Jeremy Corbyn and Grace Chatto in a T-shirt.

The “interns” think the T-shirts’ success lies with both medium and message, citing “a heavy young demographic that love this kind of irreverent stuff and people who genuinely just want to show Corbyn lots of support in a way that’s relevant to them” as fans. They won’t share sales figures, or talk about celebrity wearers, but they have promised to start stocking them again once they have stopped “looking at Theresa May memes”.

They also answer one of the most-asked questions among the under-21 electorate: is Nike pro-Labour? “The Nike CEO loves them,” claims one “intern”. “He made all his board wear them for the last board meeting.” Nike themselves were unavailable for comment. Also, being American, their leaning is a moot point. It’s also likely an apocryphal story. But if true, it’s quite a coup.

The success of this merch certainly feels pertinent if young people are feeling more politically motivated, as is being floated by the media. The hope today is that they will carry the same message to the polling booth.

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