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After a visit to the USA, entrepreneur Ben Sherman was
inspired by the smart styling of the Ivy League colleges and
began making shirts in Brighton in the early 60s. Success came
soon enough as his shirts sold across Europe and the US, and in
1967 a shop, The Jade House, was opened on Brighton's Duke
Street.
It didn't take long for the Oxford shirt, complete with a
button-down collar, back-pleat and packaged in distinctive
black boxes with orange logos, to gain cult status.
Expansion to Carnaby Street soon followed and as demand
overwhelmed the original Brighton factory, production was moved
to Northern Ireland. Sherman himself sold the company in 1975
and moved to Australia where he lived until his death in
1987.
On the face of it, it's a fairly typical story about a
successful clothing business, but, as the exhibition ably
demonstrates, it's so much more than that.
As I approached the glass case containing 40 years of Ben
Sherman heritage, even the security guard couldn't resist
telling me he still had a pair of Ben Sherman desert boots at
home.
The brand it seems is not so much about clothes but a way of
life, a label, a status symbol that projects an image and tells
the world exactly what you're about.
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