Can you ever really have too many T-shirts? If the answer is no, then you might want to check a relativity new upstate company with a retro flare. It's the vision of a former athlete whose designs have made it to sports' biggest stage.

For Anthony Wasiyo, T-shirts are a canvas.

“I feel like shirts were the easiest way to express myself,” he said.

It’s a creative process that combines original artwork and a computer design program.

In just minutes, a blank T-shirt becomes a mini mural of this year’s Super Bowl Halftime headliner, Kendrick Lamar.

In many ways, Wasiyo’s journey here began on the football field. From high school in the Capital Region to college at Buffalo State University and the University at Buffalo, and finally a successful stint in arena football, it was time to hang it up.

“My knees are done,” he said. “I had three knee surgeries. And I was like, ‘I’ve to figure something else out.’ I was working as a cleaner.

“I started sending out drawings to my agent and other connections and stuff and I was like, ‘yeah, this could be something.’” 

Inspired by a decade he has little memory of, he decided to go big — using colors, fits and concepts from the 1990s.

The feedback among athletes was overwhelming.

“They love that era too,” Wasiyo said. “I’m hoping I can bring that to the masses.”

Wasiyo decided to get into the custom T-shirt business and risk it all on an expensive printer. 

“If I failed and couldn’t make the payments on my $35,000 machine, we move on, you know? I live with that failure,” said Wasiyo.

As for how he afforded that printer?

“I financed it,” he laughed. “[I] maxed out every credit card I owned, figured out anything I could figure out, scraping pennies together and then put it together.”

It’s a gamble that paid off. 

Wasiyo’s work was noticed by some big names in the NFL and then the NBA. Through social media and connections made through his football days, Planet Euphoria was born.

In just two years, business is booming.

“We were a one-man operation when I was just doing everything, and now, we’re over 18 employees,” said Wasiyo.

His team prints as many as 400 shirts a day and ships them out from his new expanded brick-and-mortar location in Schenectady.

“Today we actually sent some to the Chiefs,” Wasiyo said. “This is a Taylor Swift–Travis Kelce design. Some of his teammates wanted to make fun of them together. It is not for sale, but we had some fun to send this out, but hopefully on Sunday, you might see her wearing this underneath her jacket or something.”

Wasiyo and his team will be at the big game in New Orleans selling T-shirts and promoting their designs — just another stop on journey he hopes is just beginning.

“This business is only two years old so for us to get going like this is just huge,” said Wasiyo.

While T-shirts seem to never go out of style, Wasiyo knows it's the artwork and design that's the future of this business, which is why he allows the athlete or celebrity to purchase the rights to the design so they can market them themselves and sell their own merchandise.