All about "Gams" (*)

In the beginning there was the Gams! Really, the Gams is timeless and therefore exists much longer than poorly filled beer glasses. Anyway, this story started with the Gams!

The story happens in Bavaria (South Germany). Here, we find mountains which are such high that even very long-necked swans go green with envy and search their charity as king mascots.

Gams on mountain plateau
Ok, mountains are high, that's easy to figure out. But those phlegmatic relicts of tectonic movements feature even more: They also can be beastly cliffy and inaccessibly. Yes, and now we can see the point: We are on the point of falling down! Not so the Gams. Good old Darwin gave her really ingenious hoofs - narrow, soft foot area with hard and fast edges - ideal for climbing mountains.

  Gams at work This very fact would only be of little value for such a sensational story. But our Gams is a special one (of course!). Our Gams is typically bavarian: incredibely cool and absolutely en vogue . Thus, the standard fur jerkin and naked hoofs were not very satisfying and the Gams every evening worked on a reproduction of these very special hoofs as a chich pair of shoes. And after all: The Gams made it!

  People with sharp tongues said that the Gams only had built those shoes to avoid beer dripping on his hoofs whenever the Gams returned from the pub in the valley ... but we don't believe this.

Of course, there were some shrewd men that followed the Gams and also manufactured such shoes, which became famous as "Haferlschuhe" (traditional brogues). One of those shrewd men is Achim Wünsch (also known as the man behind www.halfs.de). As a successful producer of "Haferlschuhe" (traditional brogues) he knows the Gams for quite a long time.
Gams holding a stein and climbing up a mountain
And there's another person who is familiar with the Gams: Maximilian Lückenhaus, a very artistic illustrator and designer who grew up at the foot of the Bavarian mountains. Obviously, he always was concerned with feet and mountain animals, such as the Gams. On a sunny afternoon in Munich-Schwabing, those two guys decided to put all those things together: Gams, Bavaria, Fashion, Coolness.

The Gams was really thrilled - maybe just because of the hope to impress Lovely (, this well beloved girl of which the Gams dreams every night, but that's another story). And meanwhile, it became reality: the Gams, in Bavaria, on t-shirts, chic and cool.

And don't forget: Whoever can, can also buy those wonderful t-shirts: Get the Gams!


(*) Note: "Gams" also is the bavarian word for chamois - this nice animal which lives in the mountains, preferably in the Alps.
      Gams approaching Munich