Compound Gallery’s Ira Lafontaine and owner Katsu Tanaka initially conceived of the Cosign Project as a way to reduce the size of their accumulated shoe and apparel collections. When they shared this idea with friends and customers, they found that others had also amassed collections of deadstock and used shoes that needed selling, but lacked the time to sell them on eBay and didn’t want to simply give them to other secondhand stores that would only return ~15-20% of the selling price.
Katsu has been working closely with compound associates Christian Davis, Tim Blanchard and Wyatt Coxen to expand this concept and build the new re-sale business model in which everyone (participants, customers and Co-sign) can benefit equally.
The objectives for the Cosign Project are:
- Contribute to sustainability by recycling clothes and shoes no longer used. As a culture, we produce too many new goods and needlessly throw away lightly worn items. Hopefully these unused/lightly used goods can find a home.
- Make available unreleased and old shoes that collectors would otherwise not have a chance to buy.
- Improve upon the resale model of vintage clothing dealers to give higher returns to participants while still being a worthwhile venture for Compound.
The first Cosign event was held in the gallery section of Compound in January 2011 and has been held every other month since then.
We are still in the process of improving our service and value your opinions and input.
 Ask Tim about shoes |
 Ask Christian about Apparel |
 Ask Wyatt about other stuff |