Grief-stricken memorialize loved ones on 'R.I.P. T-shirts'

MIAMI They come to put their dead relatives and friends on a T-shirt.

A young woman clutches a photo of her murdered 16-year-old brother. He grins at the camera, his right hand clutching a gun. Three young men line up to pay homage to one of their friends, a "street soldier," with his Facebook profile picture.

Here at Studio X, inside the U.S.A. Flea Market, miles away from South Beach in a gritty pocket of Liberty City, is where black Miami's killed are memorialized. Pictures of the deceased are stamped onto plaques and necklace charms, but a majority of customers come to put a picture on a T-shirt.

For the bereaved who robe themselves in these memorial shirts, the act is a public expression of their loss. It is a ritual they turn to in their time of grief. It is a testimony of a life prematurely taken by violence in neighborhoods where these killings don't always make the news cycle.

The Studio X booth, with its purpose emblazoned on a sign out front - "Home of the R.I.P. T-shirts" - is often the first stop before funeral arrangements. And long after the funeral is over, the grief-stricken return. They come on their lost loved one's birthday and on the anniversary of the killing for more T-shirts to proclaim their sadness. Here, love is a memorial worn close to the heart and out in the street.

Ayleen Lopez, the soft-spoken graphic designer on duty, gently directs customers to a menu of images beneath plexiglass to use as a background for the photo of their loved ones.

"People do it because it's their way of remembering someone they loved," she said. "Not everyone understands it. In Miami, in the 'hood, this is how you show this person means something to me."

Menu item CR-14 depicts a cross topped with a crown of thorns. CR-17 is a pair of hands clasped in prayer. G-13 is Miami's skyline bordered by what looks like two AK-47 assault rifles on top and, along the bottom, a row of bullets.

Studio X is one of the better-known memorial shirt-printing enterprises locally, but similar businesses dot strip malls and flea markets throughout South Florida. They are part of the urban background of inner cities across the country.

"It should be once in a blue moon, but every week it's another body," said Leonard Brown, who designed memorial shirts for 12 years at StudioX.

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Grief-stricken memorialize loved ones on 'R.I.P. T-shirts'