Forty Five

I’m really happy to rep Plymouth store Forty Five – founders Mary and Dave are bringing the independent style strong to the city, which is sadly lacking these kind of unique shops. Mary can tell you more…

“Forty Five is me - Mary and my husband Dave, plus a handful of lovely part time ladies that work in our Bristol store.

Dave had been designing his own t-shirt brand for a few years, selling into independent stores and chains like Cult, and as his business took off we decided to open our own shop to showcase brands like ourselves and other independent brands too. We decided there was a gap in the market in Plymouth and that it desperately needed an alternative to the chain stores that dominate the town centre.”

Forty Five is inspired by…”Anything and everything - people on the street that make their own stuff and work individual looks, vintage clothing, architecture, graff.”

“As far as the stock goes we are gradually increasing the amount of organic and ethically produced clothing as it becomes more available. When we first opened Forty Five in February 2007 there really wasn't any well designed ethical or environmentally friendly clothing out there. In the last 18 months this has changed dramatically and nearly all the t-shirts we stock are sustainabally and ethically sourced. We also know all the designers that we stock in our store, and the majority of them visit the manufacturers that they use to ensure they are working in an ethical way. In our coffee shops we use rain forest alliance certified coffee and organic + fair trade certified tea, our other food and drink is local and mostly organic, our icecream comes from Langage farm just outside devon, our soft drinks come from Luscombe farm in Devon, our soup is from Rod & Bens farm just outside Exeter and we use local bakeries for our paninis and other breads.” Yummy!

Forty Five has great advice for all budding entrepreneurs…

“Know who your customer is and what they want. Location is really important. Keep your costs as minimal as possible - you don't have to spend a ton of money to open a store.”

But in the meanwhile…”We're expanding the Plymouth store into the unit next door and opening and in-store coffee shop, like our Bristol store. We also have plans for a few more Forty Five stores over the next few years....so watch this space!”

Forty Five also sponsor the best Plymouth club night, Battlestations, for serious graffing, dancing, hiphopping, MCing, baking and more. Get thee down there second Thursday of the month!

Afternoon Delight

The first Afternoon-Tee has been a success! Sunday was sunny enough for sunglasses, the drinks flowed, music played all afternoon, and many of the great labels were there to sell their wares. I met a few of the people there representing their labels, and it was great to see all this talent in one place.
And! On Sunday I heard from James, the organiser, that this will be a bi-annual event (or possbly even more!) with the promise of an accompanying online shop selling the brands showcased and even a clubnight. So I'll keep my ears to the ground for this!
And meanwhile keep checking out www.afternoon-tee.co.uk for the latest.

Afternoon Tee

On Sunday Oct 12th, Air Bar in Plymouth will be hosting Afternoon-Tee, a sample and clothing sale which will feature South West and other independent brands. Among the labels at this unique event will be...

http://www.channel-3.co.uk/ (who I've just featured!)
http://www.appliedclothing.co.uk/
http://www.underthehatclothing.co.uk/
http://www.skank.com/
http://www.southcoastclothing.com/
http://www.pimpmyhoodie.co.uk/
http://www.lhome.co.uk/
http://www.yesplsnothnx.com/
http://www.funkrushclothing.com/
http://www.bantum.co.uk/
http://www.distresstoimpress.com/
http://www.rebuscollective.com/
http://www.slutclothing.co.uk/
http://www.slipalongtrevaskis.co.uk/
...as well as accessories, and live screenprinting demonstrations (which is really cool!).

Not only will you be able to shop, but there will be DJs including http://www.myspace.com/fajitafunk, MC Lacey from Scribes, and http://www.myspace.com/thedirtyfashions playing all day. Not only that, there'll also be an after-party in Cuba, right next door, where you can celebrate your hot new purchases!
This is going to be hot! I'm definitely going to try and be there. The sale starts from 12pm
Check out the details on the Facebook page at http://www.afternoon-tee.co.uk/.

Channel-3

I've never met Lee Spence but I can hear his enthusiasm for his new brand http://www.channel-3.co.uk whose online shop opens Monday (that's tomorrow!), in the following interview he did for me.

“Hello! My name’s Lee Spence, I’m 19 years old and I am the founder of channel-3 – a new lifestyle clothing design company born in the city of Plymouth, UK. It’s just me, for now, but a lot of people have helped out and have shown support along the way, too many to mention, but to all those people, thank you. It takes teamwork to make the dreamwork.
After leaving PCAD where I studied Graphic Design, in Summer 07 I knew that University wasn’t the route I wanted to take. I planned to break into the industry and find a placement within a local Graphic Design company. But it didn’t really work out that way due to my lack of experience, on paper, and my fresh out of college status. Around Christmas 07 I came up with the idea to go it alone and develop my own creative business. I was already running a personal side project under the name of “channel-3” which at the time was just a website and a way of showcasing some local snowboarding, skateboarding and design talent. Side note, the name channel-3 came about in 2005 when I dislocated my knee playing Frisbee! I started playing around with some designs on my home computer and then came across a website design program. It’s basically because there were 3 of us that used to snowboard at the local Plymouth dry slope, so 3 different styles, 3 different people, 3 channels, as if you were switching styles through a TV or something. And from there 3 has just been the magic number so the name’s stuck. I found clothing to be a real good outlet for my designs and I was just getting into fashion at the time, plus I had already touched on t-shirt printing when I was back in college, so it all pretty much came together from there.”

“Channel 3 is inspired by a lot of things from a lot of different places. For actual personal inspiration and motivation my main source is music. I’m into a lot of inspirational music with meaningful lyrics that really connect with me, and just lifestyles of people who have done the whole from nothing to something thing, all that inspires me. I’m also into a lot of movies! As for the brand, and the designs, there are a lot of other brands out there that inspire me and I have a big list of favourites on my web browser for fashion blogs, cool hunting sites, streetwear sites, brand websites etc. I like to keep up to date with what’s going on in the industry. I think, when you can take different influences from a lot of different places and then combine them all together and put your own spin on it, that’s when it works.”
Lee tells us about his green plans…“For now I’m just using 100% cotton t-shirts but when I get to the stage where I can start manufacturing, fair trade and eco-friendly clothing materials is something I definitely want to get involved in. Beside the clothes, channel-3 uses recycled and recyclable materials everywhere possible. All papers are 100% recycled, the card too, and the flyers are printed on recycled pulp board using vegetable based inks. Recyclable poly-mailers are used for the packaging and sending out the shirts. It’s definitely something that I stick to and feel quite strongly about.”

On starting your own independent brand

"It’s always hard when you try breaking the norm because people don’t see how it could work but if you stick at it then it will be worth it.That’s what I keep telling myself anyway!".
“As for the future, I’m looking to steadily expand the range of clothing to the point where channel-3 is a full clothing line that is selling worldwide. I definitely don’t want to define what channel-3 is and close any doors so the future is pretty open right now. There are endless amounts of designs in the pipeline that are eager to blow and a lot of crazy ideas lined up (crazy good). There are loads of tradeshows that I want to attend, and the dream is to be able to travel with the channel-3 brand and introduce it to new people around the world. It’s something that I really believe in so I just want people to be able to connect with the project and like the clothes! So, stay tuned!”