Not without reason, Josh finds it difficult to confine A Store Like 94 within any stable definition. Originating in a small town in the south-east of the United Kingdom, the project moves freely between archive, collection, editorial platform and community brand. In doing so, it mirrors the character of its creator, following a logic governed as much by intuition as by affection. Within this universe, bootleg acquires a significance that extends beyond the simple opposition between the authentic and the counterfeit. The official object is compelled to address the widest possible audience; it must remain compatible with the demands of the market. The bootleg, by contrast, can indulge in excess, error and irony, while alluding to subcultures whose codes are anything but universally familiar. In its imperfection, it speaks less of football as an industry than of the people who inhabit it, preserving the traces of a popular culture.

Collecting thus becomes a form of education. The habit of visiting flea markets, cultivated since childhood alongside his grandmother, taught Josh that value rarely announces itself openly. It must be sought among neglected objects and recognised in artefacts devoid of financial prestige yet saturated with human experience, created for no reason other than the love of a team. Over time, this apparently solitary gesture evolved into a relational practice. From assembling objects, A Store Like 94 moved towards building connections, collaborations, exhibitions and friendships across different geographies, all united by the same devotion to the Beautiful Game.

A Store Like 94 exists somewhere between a brand, an archive, a collector’s obsession and a community. When you first began the project, what did you feel was missing from the way contemporary football culture remembered and represented itself?

“To be honest, I sometimes struggle to describe what A Store Like 94 actually is.  When I started the project eight years ago, I didn’t really feel like anything was missing, I just wanted to make something I was excited about. At the time there wasn’t a huge amount of creative football content on Instagram, and after selling vintage football shirts since 2012, I was ready to do something different.

I wanted to shine a light on the more obscure side of football culture, especially the artwork, bootlegs, forgotten memorabilia, and all the weird little details that often get overlooked. From there, A Store Like 94 has just evolved organically. There was never a grand business plan or long-term strategy; it’s simply been about staying genuine, following whatever I’m interested in, and collaborating with as many friendly independent artists, brands, and creatives as possible.”

The word “bootleg” traditionally implies something unofficial. Yet some football objects seem to carry more personality, affection and cultural truth than the merchandise produced by the game itself. What can an unofficial object express that an official one often cannot?

“I think the first thing is to separate official merchandise from unofficial bootlegs. Official merchandise has to appeal to a huge audience, so it’s naturally a lot safer. It’s polished, carefully managed and usually driven by marketing campaigns. Bootlegs don’t have those restrictions. They’re made by fans, for fans, which means they can be much more personal, funny, nostalgic or even a bit confrontational.

The best unofficial pieces tell you more about the people who love football than the game itself. They celebrate cult heroes, inside jokes, terrace culture, forgotten players, strange sponsors, knock-off graphics and moments that would never make it onto an official shirt. They’re often imperfect, but that’s exactly what gives them their personality and charm.

Obviously times have changed, and copyright laws have become much stricter, but some of the unofficial pieces from the ’90s still haven’t been bettered. They had a freedom and creativity that really resonated with me, and those bootlegs were a huge inspiration when I first started A Store Like 94. In many ways, bootlegs preserve the culture around football, while official merchandise tends to preserve the business of football.”

What are you actually searching for when you find an object? Is it rarity, beauty, imperfection, the story behind it — or something more instinctive that cannot quite be explained?

“Honestly, it’s a bit of all of the above. I’ve been addicted to flea markets and boot fair culture since I was a kid. Every weekend my grandmother would give me a couple of pounds and take me to local sales, and looking back I think that’s where I really developed an eye for spotting treasures that other people might overlook.

I also think it’s important to have a clear focus. If you don’t set yourself some boundaries, it’s very easy to become a hoarder. I tend to concentrate on pieces from the late ’80s through to the early 2000s because that’s the era that really speaks to me. It was also an incredible period for manufacturing, so even a lot of the unofficial or bootleg items were surprisingly well made.

The pieces that excite me the most, though, are examples of football folk art things like hand-painted crests, homemade banners, paper mâché figures or one off fan creations. Those objects weren’t made in factories or produced in thousands. Someone made them purely because they loved their club, and that’s what makes them so special. They’re completely unique, and they’re some of the most treasured pieces in my personal collection.

The football world you return to most often is that of the 1990s. What did that era possess visually and culturally that you feel contemporary football has lost?

“I think it was a unique period where football was becoming more commercial, but it hadn’t yet become the global corporate machine it is today. Designers, manufacturers and football federations were still finding their feet, there were fewer rules and restrictions, and there was simply a lot less money involved. That meant less red tape and, ultimately, a lot more creative freedom. You could see that freedom everywhere in the shirt patterns, sponsor logos, manufacturer branding and even the personalities of the players themselves. Nothing felt overly polished or financially focused and it all had a bit more character. For me, that’s why the 90s remain such a special era. It felt authentic, experimental and full of personality. It’s no coincidence that football still looks back to that period for inspiration today, and I think people will continue to do so for many years to come.”

A Store Like 94 began with hunting and collecting, but has increasingly moved towards collaboration and cultural production. At what point did you realise that you also wanted to help create new football related artworks?

“I live in a fairly quiet seaside town on the South East coast of the UK, so for a long time I felt quite disconnected from the wider football creative community. At first I found that frustrating, but eventually I realised I already had the solution. I just needed to lean into something I’ve always been good at, which is making friends. I started reaching out to people online, building genuine relationships and travelling more to meet creatives in person. That completely changed everything. Now I have football friends all over the globe, and some of those relationships have become really close and helped me through hard times.

Those friendships naturally lead to collaborations because they’re built on mutual respect and a shared love of football culture, rather than business opportunities. If possible, I never go into a collaboration with money as the main motivation. I think people can tell when something has been created for the right reasons, and those are always the projects that feel the most rewarding and authentic.”

You spent two and a half years developing Fantasy Football with Brian from Deadly Prey Gallery. Do you remember the first conversation or image that made you realise these two worlds — football documentaries and Ghanaian hand-painted movie posters — belonged together?

It all started back in 2017 when I stumbled across one of these paintings at a flea market. I’d never seen anything like it before and instantly fell in love with how wild this form of art was, so I started digging into their history. That research led me to a huge exhibition of Ghanaian film posters from a private collector at the Brunei Gallery in London a couple of years later, which was the gateway drug to – Deadly Prey Gallery. Like with most of my projects, I simply reached out, started a conversation with Brian, and slowly built a relationship based on trust. From there, we collaborated on our first piece back in 2022 inspired by Asif Kapadia’s Diego documentary, and that artwork ultimately became the spark for everything this collection has grown into.”

What did the eight artists bring to the football world that you, as someone immersed in the game and its imagery, had never seen before?

For me, it was the complete freedom in their approach. A lot of Ghanaian, Nigerian and West African art has this incredible energy where it feels like there are almost no creative boundaries. The colors are unbelievably bold, the compositions are unpredictable, and every artist has such a distinct personality that shines through the work. As someone who’s spent years immersed in football imagery, the only time I had seen the sport interpreted with that level of fearlessness before was in bootleg fan made culture so I guess that’s where the dots were connected for me. Football is often presented in a very polished, commercial way, whereas these paintings feel raw, expressive and deeply human. They’re chaotic in the best possible way, almost the perfect balance of madness and beauty.”

Football is probably the most visually consumed cultural form on earth, yet the art world has historically been hesitant to treat it as a serious subject. Why do you think that separation existed for so long? And what do you think about the present connection between these two worlds?

“I think the relationship between football and art has changed massively over the last decade. Historically, football was often dismissed by the art world as something too commercial or too mainstream to be taken seriously. Social media completely changed that. It gave independent artists, designers and photographers a platform to share work directly with fans, and suddenly there was this whole ecosystem of football creativity that people could actually see. Even five years ago it felt like a relatively small community. Now it’s an incredible universe of illustrators, painters, filmmakers, photographers, ceramicists and designers, all interpreting the game in their own way.

Another big shift has been that clubs and brands have started recognising the value of independent creatives. Instead of everything feeling corporate, they’re collaborating with artists on shirt launches, campaigns, exhibitions and matchday experiences. That has inspired a whole new generation to realise that football can be a legitimate subject for creative work. The thing football has that a lot of other subjects don’t is an emotional connection. It gives people a real sense of identity, belonging and pride. When you make work about your club or your country, you’re tapping into something deeply personal that millions of other people understand instantly. That’s incredibly powerful.

Even this Fantasy Football exhibition was a new experience for me. I’d never curated an art exhibition like this before, but it reminded me that football can be a vehicle for telling much bigger stories. At its best, football art isn’t really about football at all, it’s about community, memory, identity and emotion.”

You have spoken about the exhibition as a form of escapism during a controversial World Cup period. When the institution surrounding the game becomes difficult to love, can art help us recover a more personal relationship with football itself?

“I definitely think it can, but it also depends on the intention behind the work. The best creative projects have come from people who want to contribute something positive to the culture, rather than just chasing attention or marketing opportunities.

This World Cup has felt like a bit of a meme tournament on social media, which I suppose is inevitable with the rise of AI and the speed that content gets made now. But alongside that, there have also been some brilliant collaborations, exhibitions at independent watch parties happening across the U.S. Those projects have reminded people that football is still about community, creativity and shared experiences.

For me, that’s where art can really help. It gives people a more personal connection and an alternative to the commercial side of modern football. When ticket prices and FIFA’s decisions leave people feeling disconnected, independent creative projects can bring the focus back to what made us fall in love with football in the first place. Football is for everyone.”

The World Cup has always been more than a tournament. Every edition produces its own visual universe: posters, mascots, shirts, television graphics, photographs and advertisements. How important have these images been in building your own memory of football?

“I think those visuals are everything when it comes to how I remember football. I actually struggle with years blurring into one another, especially World Cups, so I always try to make sure I do something different around each tournament to give that four-year cycle its own identity in my memory. Sometimes that’s travelling somewhere new, creating a project, or collecting something that captures that moment.

Looking back, I often remember a World Cup through the shirts, the TV graphics, the posters, the adverts or even a particular photograph before I remember the football itself. Those visual details instantly transport you back to a certain time in your life. That’s one of the reasons Fantasy Football has been so special for me. It’ll always be tied to the 2026 World Cup in my mind.”

What do you hope remains on a bigger scale after the exhibition closes? 

“The idea has always been that these paintings have a life beyond this exhibition, which is why none of the original works are for sale. I want them to keep travelling, keep being seen, and keep reaching new audiences.

I’m already looking forward to bringing them back out for the next Euros and, especially, the 2030 World Cup in Spain. There’s something incredibly powerful about seeing these Ghanaian paintings in person. The colours, the brushstrokes, the material they are painted on create a feeling that’s difficult to put into words. I just hope people will continue to experience and enjoy them for many tournaments to come.”

The ‘Fantasy Football‘ prints, created in collaboration with the Deadly Prey Gallery, are available on the A Store Like 94 website at this LINK.

With all the profits going back to the artists.