Hasta La Ideas

The brainchild of husband-and-wife team Joshua and Stacey Abarbanel, Jewnion Label is a witty take on vintage union label design coupled with a love of Jewish culture.

Joshua (a fine artist who honed his handyman skills as a teen doing apartment maintenance) was laughing with his wife over the notion of Jewish handymen—a group so uncommon they decided it needed its own union. The duo developed the concept, creating slogans such as “Rare are those who are able” and “Repairing the world one lightbulb at a time,” a reference to the Jewish imperative tikkun olam, meaning “to heal the world.”

Applying the slogans to a line of shirts, hats, sweatshirts and more, Jewnion Label now offers a full range of cheeky logos such as Amalgamated Menschen International, International Federation of Shofar Blowers, and Allied Matzo Ball Makers League.

Stacey tells CH, “We’re trying to hit a sweet spot between giving people a laugh or a smile and engendering a sense of pride by taking classic notions and stereotypes about Jewish culture and putting a clever, positive spin on them.”