Jeremy Corbyn has made it into fashion history after a T-shirt bearing his name and an altered Nike swoosh was acquired by the Victoria & Albert Museum for one of its galleries.

The museum, now run by Tristram Hunt, a former Labour MP and critic of Corbyn, will display the garment in its collection charting how moments of political and social change have a bearing on design trends.

A fashion label, Bristol Street Wear, released the design during the 2017 general election campaign, and it quickly became popular with supporters of the Labour leader. There are a number of pictures of fans wearing the T-shirt standing next to Corbyn, and it featured heavily at Glastonbury festival.

Hunt, the director of the V&A, said: “As the nation’s storehouse for contemporary design and fashion, we are delighted to acquire the Corbyn T-shirt. It is also a rather strong statement of our belief in curatorial autonomy.”

The V&A said the T-shirt was an example of “bootlegging”, where brands are repurposed for subversive effect. The shirt has a version of the 1971 Nike swoosh logo, with the brand replaced with Corbyn’s name.

Corinna Gardner, keeper of the V&A’s design, architecture and digital department, said the Corbyn logo on the garment was “inherently digital in its translation of online culture and memes into material form [and] enables us to ask questions about the role of data and social media in the recent election campaign”.

“Added to this, it captures the current vogue for slogan tees and the growing influence of street wear brands,” she said.



Bristol Street Wear, which donated the T-shirt, said: “It’s great to see the typically dismissed art form, ‘bootlegs’, given pride of place at the V&A. This T-shirt spoke to so many people. It was immediate, it was fun, it started debates, it was censored and it even got us into trouble – everything good art should.”

Other recently acquired items in the collection include a pussyhat from the 2017 Women’s March, a flag designed for the first refugee team to compete in the Olympic Games, a tile from the exterior of Grayson Perry’s 2015 House for Essex and a 3D-printed titanium handlebar used by the cyclist Bradley Wiggins in his hour record attempt on 7 June 2015.