Konstantin Sonev

2023-2025

Trap Wave

Trap Wave was an independent hip-hop night I founded in Groningen: a small team of friends throwing parties for the new wave of the genre, and putting that kind of nightlife in a city that had never had it.

It ran from June 2023 to February 2025. Six events, roughly 300 people each, from PEPR to Simplon. I handled artist booking, campaign planning, venue and vendor negotiation, sponsorship outreach, promo shoots, merch drops and the Instagram. Yordan Mominski, the graphic designer I built the whole thing with, drew it.

Trap Wave

Embracing the culture

Groningen has an urban youth that lives in this music and had nowhere in the city built around it. What I wanted was a room where it was the main event rather than a slot in somebody else's night, and then enough of those rooms in a row that the same people started turning up to all of them.

That is where the motto came from. Embrace the culture, and then keep saying it: it ran through the posters, the flyers, the stickers and the flags, and it is still the shortest way to describe what the nights were for.

The first one

The first edition was on 2 June 2023 at PEPR, run through Bulgarian Society Groningen as a proof of concept. It worked, and Trap Wave split off into its own thing straight after, aimed at the whole city rather than at one community inside it.

There was a giveaway on the door. I modelled and printed the tokens for it: the reward on one face, and the emblem from the poster on the other.

Four 3D-printed tokens: a crowned-lion emblem, and three reading VIP, SHOT and COCKTAIL.

The identity

The design is Yordan Mominski's. We planned each event together, went back and forth on what it should feel like and what it should look like on a wall, and then he drew it. I was the founder, he was the creative.

The logo morphs the two initials into a lightning bolt: a strike, for the electric experience we were putting on. The name is the genre, and the wave we were trying to start in the city.

It went on posters, flyers, stickers, flags, banners, badges and merch. The mockups here are his renders.

The Trap Wave logo: the letters T and W morphed into a single lightning bolt.
The Trap Wave wordmark.
A die-cut chrome bolt sticker with the account handle running down its edge.
The Instagram avatar: the wordmark over a purple collage.
Two flags and two circular stickers carrying the bolt and the motto.
A flag standing in the smoke beside the booth, crowd in front of it.
Five of the event posters pasted in a row behind glass on a street hoarding.

Event posters

Six events in two years, across three clubs.

  • The first poster: a chrome bolt over purple lightning, 02 June, dress code black.
    2 June 2023PEPRDJ Zander
  • The second poster: an iridescent chrome bolt on a glitched dark ground, 13 Oct.
    13 October 2023PEPRDJ Zander, Lesfleursdumal
  • The third poster: purple and black, pixel-art aliens, and Embracing the culture across the bottom.
    29 March 2024OOST, second floorDJ Melo, DJ Zander, SRSK
  • The fourth poster: a rendered Nokia 3310 with the wordmark on its screen.
    28 June 2024OOST, first floorShahiem, Boko, DJ Zander, SRSK
  • The fifth poster: a night street scene with a coupe, a figure in black and a dog.
    18 October 2024OOST, first floorSRSK, Boko, Shahiem, Zander
  • The sixth poster: high-contrast purple and magenta halftones over old broadcast equipment.
    21 February 2025Simplon, first floorSigo, Boko, Zander, SRSK

Motion graphics and 3D

The design is Yordan's. The 3D and the motion are mine.

  • Trap Wave 4Announcement 3D animation
  • Trap Wave 5Announcement 3D animation
  • Trap Wave 6Announcement 3D animation
  • Trap Wave 4DJ post
  • Trap Wave 4DJ post
  • Trap Wave 4DJ post
  • Trap Wave 4DJ post
A real 3310, ordered to shoot this.
Trap Wave 3

Merch

Two drops. A white tee with the wordmark on the chest and a pile of old phones and handhelds across the back, and a Halloween edition in black with the bolt on the chest. Yordan drew both. We worked out what they should be together, and I funded and produced the runs.

The white tee, wordmark printed small on the left chest.
The back of the white tee: a black and white pile of old phones, a PSP and a handheld console.
The black Halloween tee, bolt printed small on the centre chest.
The back of the black tee: a blown-out lightning wordmark in white.
Folded tees stacked on the merch table beside a banner reading Embracing the culture.
A white tee folded to show the phones print across the back.
Someone wearing the white tee on the floor, back print lit blue.
Two people in the black Halloween tee, one showing the chest bolt and one the back print.

The nights

  • A packed floor at PEPR under green and red light, balloons across the ceiling.
    Trap Wave 1
    A scattered pile of the printed flyers under red and purple light.
    Trap Wave 3·Flyers
  • The same room in purple, a raised fist in the middle of the crowd.
    Trap Wave 1
    The room from the back: the bolt and the motto on the backdrop, screens either side.
    Trap Wave 4
  • Trap Wave 4·Promo
    The crowd facing a grid of six screens behind the booth.
    Trap Wave 4
    Trap Wave 2·Aftermovie
  • The floor at PEPR from the back, the club name on the wall behind.
    Trap Wave 1
    A DJ behind the decks at OOST, the screen grid lit behind him.
    Trap Wave 4
  • Trap Wave 1·Aftermovie
    A DJ in profile under pink light.
    Trap Wave 6
  • Trap Wave 6·Promo
    The stage at Simplon, the booth backlit and the flags either side.
    Trap Wave 6
    Trap Wave 5·Aftermovie
  • An MC on the microphone beside the booth.
    Trap Wave 6
    A DJ mixing under white light, the room hazy behind.
    Trap Wave 6
    A DJ laughing mid-set, hand on his chest.
    Trap Wave 6
  • 2024·Recap
    A silhouetted crowd against the screen wall at Simplon.
    Trap Wave 6
    Trap Wave 6·Aftermovie

Credits

All work