What Is GOOPiMADE? Smirk, Leo, and Taiwan Urban Outdoor
What is GOOPiMADE? GOOPiMADE is the Taiwan urban-outdoor clothing label Chen Chang and Yo Lee — better known as Smirk and Leo — built from 2016 beside their select shop GOOPi.co. Limited drops, Taiwan-developed technical fabrics, and a loose, broad-shoulder silhouette define the look. This explainer covers the brand for shoppers mapping Taiwan streetwear.
Cover photo: Alfred Twu — Alley in Ximending, Taipei — CC0. Also on Wikimedia Commons. Resized for web. Taipei street mood for GOOPiMADE; not a brand storefront or product shot.
GOOPi sits on the Taiwan street map next to the broader Asian context in our Asian Streetwear Guide.
GOOPi.co First, Then GOOPiMADE
The official GOOPi.co About page dates the project to 2016 in Taiwan and frames GOOPi.co as an urban-outdoor select shop of functional garments and designer brands, with GOOPiMADE as the house label focused on fabric quality, function, and detail. A November 2023 Vogue feature names founders Chen Chang and Yo Lee by their internet personas Smirk and Leo, and says Goopi.co came first as a multi-brand outdoor-fashion retailer before the clothing line that made the silhouette famous.
Vogue reports that Goopi.co still runs alongside the label, stocking dozens of outside brands plus GOOPiMADE, and that the company attributes roughly forty percent of overall income to the select shop and the rest to GOOPiMADE. That dual model — Japanese-style “select shop” curation plus an in-house technical line — is central to how GOOPi talks about itself.
孤僻: Reclusive Name, Public Drops
In Chinese profiles such as Economic Daily News, GOOPi is read as “孤僻” — reclusive or stubbornly independent. Those pieces describe a 2016 start with about NT$6,000, LINE-based pre-orders, and a tiny loft office while Smirk finished military service (including uniform logistics that fed his interest in military detailing) and Leo studied and worked retail. Heaven Raven’s 2019 interview with Smirk adds that neither founder came from fashion school; Leo floated “make the clothes we want” as work near the end of his service.
The same Chinese features say GOOPiMADE exists because the pair wanted garments they would actually wear — not because they planned a conventional seasonal house. The reclusive name stuck as attitude: do your own thing without needing the room’s approval.
Urban Outdoor, Local Fabric, Independent Drops
Vogue describes GOOPiMADE’s “urban outdoor” character: technical ideas brought into city clothes, loose fits and broad shoulders that local fans nicknamed a “clone army” when worn head to toe. Smirk tells Vogue that each product is developed with dedicated fabrics from local textile partners, that fabric R&D alone can take up to eight months, and that a single garment from scratch often takes ten to fourteen months — so fashion-week seasonality cuts against the brand’s pace. Pieces usually drop individually rather than as a full seasonal collection.
Official About stresses fabric quality and function first. Vogue estimates that about seventy percent of products use fabrics designed with Taiwanese mills, and notes international stockists including End Clothing and HBX among twenty-three doors outside Taiwan at the time of that article. Select-shop partners have co-signed capsules — Vogue cites United Arrows knitwear, GQ Shop tailoring, and Manchester’s This Thing Of Ours as examples of how stockist collabs stretch the wardrobe beyond one outdoor formula.
Why GOOPi Matters for Asian Streetwear Shoppers
If you are mapping Taiwan after Japanese techwear or Korean logo street, GOOPiMADE is a clear local case of select-shop taste plus mill-level fabric work: limited drops, urban-outdoor cut, and a retail twin (GOOPi.co) that taught customers the mix before the house line scaled. It shows how Taiwan textile strength can feed a young label without copying Harajuku wholesale.
For more reading, see the Asian Streetwear Guide and What Is Streetwear? 15 Streetwear Outfit Ideas.
FAQ
What is GOOPiMADE?
GOOPiMADE is a Taiwan urban-outdoor clothing label launched from 2016 by Smirk and Leo beside their select shop GOOPi.co. Official About frames it as a function-and-fabric-led house brand; Vogue highlights limited drops and local textile R&D.
Who founded GOOPi?
Chen Chang (Smirk) and Yo Lee (Leo), per Vogue and Chinese founder profiles. Smirk is often described as CEO/creative lead; Leo as co-founder and operations.
When did GOOPi start?
2016, per official About and Vogue. GOOPi.co and GOOPiMADE both date to that founding year in those sources.
What does GOOPi look like?
Loose, broad-shoulder urban outdoor clothes with technical fabrics and detail-heavy function, released in limited individual drops rather than classic fashion-week seasons, per Vogue and About.
Is GOOPi only a clothing brand?
No. Official About and Vogue describe GOOPi.co as a continuing multi-brand select shop; GOOPiMADE is the in-house line sold through that ecosystem and outside stockists.