Fits him to a T

ROBERT SPENCER for the boston globeScott Lanes creates T-shirts that feature images of grenades, T tokens, and more. (ROBERT SPENCER for the boston globe)

We're all dreaming about our second acts these days. But designer Scott Lanes has already been there, done that. In the '80s, Lanes was a bouncer at clubs like Man Ray and Ground Zero, places packed with black-clad goths in search of the best industrial and punk rock the area had to offer. Those gigs paid the bills, and when, say, Bjork and the Sugarcubes would show up and hang out, well, that was the icing on the cupcake.

But Lanes's real loves were photography and silk-screening. During the day, he worked as a photographer's assistant for next to nothing. When he had a spare moment he'd silk-screen T-shirts for bands and friends. Lanes had an eye for it. He'd always had a sense of style, and spending his life in photography studios and nightclubs honed it.

"I'm a T-shirt fanatic," Lanes says. He's wearing a couple of his own designs, an olive-drab shirt and a red hoodie, both screened with an image of a hand grenade, so big and close up that it looks like a human heart. "I live in T-shirts all year long."

Now he produces them all year long, too, out of his studio in Salem. The screening process is much more high-tech than when he started, he says, and more subtle. Lanes shoots images digitally, scans the prints out full size, and then burns the screens. He uses the best inks and T-shirts he can find, so that the designs will last and the shirts hold up wash after wash.

"I only wanted to do high end, high quality. I really want these to be people's favorite shirts," he says, speaking like a true T-shirt aficionado.

Lanes calls his company Peace Through Violence (www.peaceviolence.com). As the name implies, his designs are not for those seeking pictures of cuddly kittens or floppy-eared beagles. Lanes likes some edge to his fashion. Brass knuckles are a favorite, as are images of skulls, gas masks, and syringes.

But he's also drawn to old T tokens, enlarged so they look more like manhole covers. And on one shirt, Lanes uses an old photograph he shot of the Salem Theater. It was 1982. The marquee advertises "King Kong" (a dreadful remake, he recalls, starring Jessica Lange) and "Fast Times at Ridgemont High." The theater's long gone now, but the image, complete with patrons buying tickets, crackles with life.

He's gotten good responses to his line. Last year at the SoWa Open Market, he sold out of almost everything. John Malkovich happened by and bought a hot pink shirt with grenades cartwheeling down one side. Lately Lanes has expanded into baby clothes, after he made a onesie for a friend's baby and all the adults who saw it went nuts with delight.

"This one guy said 'kids are the ultimate fashion accessory,' " Lanes said. "You can control what they wear, so if you're putting your kid in a Joe Strummer T-shirt, it says something about you."