Ben Sherman was a legend in his own right. A man described as ‘always embracing the new and the different’; someone constantly searching for the best of things. He disliked regularity, preferring to search out things that were perceived as unavailable to him. He was a passionate businessman with an artist’s soul. Ben started making shirts for other people. But soon his creative flair took over and he started designing his own shirts. Then in 1963 he was ready to launch the first Ben Sherman shirt. The shirts were a huge success, offering something brand new and previously unseen in England. The feeling was that there simply had never been anything on the English scene like it. The Ben Sherman shirt was revolutionary and so was the ‘mod movement’. Through fashion and music, London and Britain were cool again, the swinging 60’s was in full flow and the atmosphere was euphoric. Now having existed for 5 decades the Ben Sherman shirt and brand have been adopted by almost every youth culture or style movement of the last 5 decades, from the mods , to 2 tone and ska, to brit pop and is today still worn by the current bands and style leaders of the current decade. Ben Sherman not only created clothing history with his Ben Sherman shirt, but he created a way of thinking that has helped create a global brand today. His passion for original thinking and rejecting the normal and mundane has left a legacy that can still be witnessed today.
