This product was a winner of the ThinkGeek Bounty Program, which means the design was an original submission by one of you. Unfortunately this program doesn't exist anymore, but to all who participated in the past, we're forever grateful for your brains.

Meet Vitruvian Steve. The creation of objects in Minecraft is based on the same principles Vitruvius describes in his De Architectura: durability, usefulness, and beauty. And whether you can make them without being killed by lava and/or Creepers. He left that bit out.

Hey, it's Steve! You know Steve. His perfect, blocky proportions are highlighted on this remix of da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, suggested by one of our customers. He's surrounded by notes and sketches, as if he's been ripped right out of Notch's sketchbook. The copy for the da Vinci-esque notes on the nature of the Minecraft universe was provided by our head of evil schemes and nefarious plans (referred to in the common parlance as "marketing"), Jamie Grove. It's kind of hard to read in the scripty, "I'm writing this with a quill" font, so we're reproducing it here for your elucidation:

Next to the sword

One must become terrible and fierce in the company of mobs



Next to the piston

Machine for pushing blocks by means of redstone power



Next to the pickaxe

Let no man, who is not a stone mason, read the elements of my work



Next to the blocks

That shall be brought forth out of dark and obscure caves...



Bottom text

Every world is the termination of a number of chunks, which converge to form a map. Theoretically, the map could extend forever but for technical reasons the base is approximately eight times the surface of the earth, while the vertical plane remains a constant 128-block height.

We'll admit that we agonized a bit over the private parts. Do we include them? Do we not? We had this version, and we made a version with a fig leaf, which looked really out of place, and then we made one where Steve's private parts showed (and they were hilarious), but it got nixed by our favorite Swedes, who didn't want anybody messing around with Steve's junk. Which we understand. We didn't really want to go there in the first place. Hence this clean version.

Vitruvian Steve hangs out on this sand-colored, 100% cotton t-shirt. Officially-licensed Minecraft gear.