"My wish for the James Clarke Brand, is to gift others with confidence through my creativity and highlight individual styles through fine tailoring.  To be compassionate through the act of being kind and creating with respect, passion and dedication, remain the values at the very core of who I am and what my brand stands for.  For twenty years, I've been on a journey of developing a brand that goes beyond making a profit, by nurturing the responsibilities of being the last generation that can make a positive impact on climate change.  A brand that creates meaningful connections with its consumers with likeminded values.  With every new day and every sunrise arrive inspirations, and another chance for me to create from the layers of my style.  With every susnet, and every evening, arrive a hope, that tomorrow will be another day I can gift someone, with a smile." - James x

Whatever I learn or create, it's always with the notion... "I shall invest all my passion and style whilst being devoted to the process."  I've taken the time to slowly and thoughtfully develop my brand, and over the years, I've grown it from a single dish of chicken korma in Lancashire, a single vase of 50 white tulips in Milan, a single sailing trip on the Mediterranean, a single inspirational walk in Paris, a single coffee in Manhattan and a single tailored velvet blazer for a friend in London, to evolve into the tiny brand that it is today.  I stay open to growth whilst staying true to my brand's character and values.  My journey has evolved in stages and the formula still remains the same.  Even though I had the name James Clarke in the last Millenium, it was in May 2002 that I officially changed my brand name to that. Then in October that year, I was ready to introduce the Gardenia as the official brand logo.

On 1 October 2022, I will be celebrating 20 years of the Gardenia being my brand logo.

I still have the original sketch of my logo that I drew, the geometric gardenia as part of an art assignment at high school.  The gardenia captivated my imaginations as a child and to this day it still holds a special place in my heart.  It has previously been my brand logo for my flowers, fragrances, interiors, cakes and photography.  Now, it continues to inspire me as the logo for JC Fashion.

When I started developing my bespoke tailoring range in 2012, it became even more relevant, as the original idea of the gardenia logo came to mind, from the time I used to style and accessorise my school friend's uniforms with fresh gardenias that grew in my childhood garden.  The Gardenia is the flower of my choice for Brand James Clarke.  To see more about the JC Gardenia, please visit the page dedicated to my brand logo.

The Himalayan snow leopard is the spirit animal and the calling card of my brand.  Exploring sensuality, passions, desires, plaufulness, protection and my loyalty to quality, the symbolism of his spirit portrays my commitment and dedication to something of substance.  His name is Zev, and he helps me to leave behind a trail of sophistication, sensuality and style with everyone who experiences JC creativity.  To follow Zev on his adventures, please visit the page dedicated to him.

The contrast within my creative process.
The contrast of my lucky numbers 5 & 9; together making 14.  The contrast of odds and even, just like the masculine and the feminine.

The contrast of my resting place with only crisp white cottons and silk, and my creative space that is surrounded by colour.

The softness of the traditional womenswear fabrics lend themselves in a beautiful way to create JC menswear.  The contrast of the feminine within the masculine.

The contrast of utilising imitation gold trimmings on fabrics encrusted with real gold.

The contrast of utilising precious pearls to hang pendants of resin, glass, semi precious stones and gold plated silver.

The contrast of utilising complex techniques that remain invisible to create the elegance of simplicity in the visible design.

The contrast of the Gardenia with their delicate petals and a deep seductive fragrance speak of sensuality and romance, whilst their richly glossy leaves speak of mystery.

The contrast of my playfulness.  Heaven is where I'd want to dress the angels.  Earth is where I'd want to party with the devil.

My refusal to choose between style and what is fashionable.  There's only one choice and that is to always be stylish.

The contrast between style and comfort.  My belief that style and comfort go hand in hand.  One cannot wear something to it's full potential if one is not comfortable in it.

The contrast of mixing the opposites.  Velvets with tweeds, feminine with masculine, the woman within the man and vice versa.  Daring for the two extremes to entwine in perfect harmony.  That's where danger lives... and that's where it should be conquered.

The contrast of my character living in the space between my emotions.  Polite yet nonchalant, moody yet happy, romantic yet seductive, traditional yet contemporary, sombre yet fiery.

The contrast of remembering every detail and circumstantial references from the past as my photographic memories and learnings, but actually always living in the 'now' and for the 'future'.

The contrast of giving everyone the freedom to be anything and everything they want to be, whilst wearing James Clarke.  Yet knowing, that not everyone is meant for experiencing Bespoke or Art by James Clarke.

I have four colours at the heart of my brand. Each of them is of significance and has meaning to me.  This is where my brand phrase "Everything I create has a meaning." originated from.

BLACK, because it intensifies colour, it's the depth and darkness of my character.  Black is the distinct markings of the stealthy snow leopard.  Black, because it signifies strength, rebellion and sophistication.  Black, because it absorbs aggression, reflects mystery and evokes emotions.  Black, for me, accentuates the beauty of elegance, it's the absolute and embraced for eternity.  Black surpasses all.

WHITE,  because it's pure and enhances beauty. White, because of my memories of the fragrant white flowers that grew in my childhood garden, it evokes memories of time. White, because of the marble used to construct the most beautiful monument of love... The Taj Mahal. White is the soft snowy wilderness where the snow leopards roam.  White, because it illuminates the delicate strands of James' pearls, that adorn each collection.  And white because it represents the purest of cotton and silkiest of satin sheets when it's time to dream and love.

RED, because it's the colour of passion, the colour of the fire that smoulders within me.  Red because it represents courage and a daringly beautiful feeling of danger.  Red, because it reminds me of the vibrant cathedral roses and the seduction of the deepest red piano roses in my garden.  Red, because of the fiery sunsets during my childhood.  And red, because it evokes curiosity, and it extends the invitation to get lost in lust.

GOLD, because it represents both the genuine and the imitation.  Genuine gold that are the family treasures handed down to me and forever cherished.  Imitation gold that I re-invent time and again with platings, to adorn the clasps and buckles of my collections.  Gold because of the cultural festivals that intertwine my childhood.  Gold, because it envelopes the wearer with a sun kissed glow and seduces the voyeur.  Gold, because it dares to compliment the unity between black and white.  Gold, because it's the signature of brand James Clarke.

I fell in love with music as a child.  Since the age of 5, I soaked up knowledge and inspirations through learning, practicing, studying, listening, observing, travelling through and living within different cultures, and being influenced by artists throughout the world.  I was in London, when I made the decision to take the steps to transition full time into the world of fashion and immediately started making a long term transitional plan.  Then whilst walking in New York during a snow fall, musical notes started floating around in my mind and I knew that music would play an important part in my brand's journey when it came to fashion.  I promised myself that if I'm still tailoring JC Bespokes in 10 years time, then to mark the occassion, I will release a JC Editorial movie in 2022/2023.  A short few minutes of brand history in visuals through music, motion graphics and cinematography to highlight my journey over 10 years.  I've saved key design pieces in my studio wardrobe, and to keep the authenticity I also aim to borrow back pieces of JC Bespoke that I've created over the years to be part of the editorial movie.

I'm a visual dreamer when it comes to inspirations and aesthetics but very practical, when it comes to creating something.  So staying true to my creative process, in 2021, I did real life location tests for a few scenes, so I could start finalising the chapters and see what I needed to change within the process before filming the actual scenes.  I know my capabilities and my limitations only too well, hence I never underestimate the amount of work that's required to produce something authentic and beautiful.

I play a little piano when the mood takes me, and since I'm a realist, I knew that taking a grand piano on the beach for filming and photoshoots for one of the scenes would be out of my capabilities and the movie budget, so I came up with an alternative idea and improvised.  As a test project, I had a fold up baby grand piano shell made to fit my digital piano inside it.  I was blown away by the finished shell, it looked amazing.  I tested for colour grading with the Black Magic by wearing what I would for the actual scene, a very simple JC white cotton shirt with a pair of JC white denim chinos rolled up at the ankles.  The feeling of sitting to play on the beach was pretty incredible, although my feet would somewhat disagree with that sentiment, as they were absolutely freezing in the ice cold sea.

From putting perspex wave breakers underwater to having flat pieces of wood beneath the sand as platforms for the piano feet and the stool, to working out camera angles whilst using smoke flares, on top of that, all the natural elements, such as birds flying, changing wind directions and spray from the sea.  It was a weekend of learnings but I loved every minute of this test project.  I took away those learnings to make the changes and fine tune my process for events to run smoothly when it comes to filming the actual scene.

These type of tests are an important part of my brand's creative process.  99% of the time, no one gets to see the work I put in behind the scenes and how my studio gets filled up with things that I test with.  I work with time lines in advance and even though sometimes it may seem as though I've just decided to create something out of the blue, I know how much time, planning and hard work has gone into the creative process before hand, to be able to have a finished product that I'm happy with.  Test projects take an enormous amount of planning and then more time for post project evaluations to create the findings to improve the process.  Whatever I create, I make sure that I spend the time for research and development, risk assesments, structured plans of time lines and carry out testings before I create and release the final products.  That's my dedication and my uncompromising work ethics to build the best version of my brand that I possibly can.  My creative process is a vital part of it all, because the end products are for the loyal followers of my brand, whom I value, and I take that as a serious responsibility by nurturing and paying attention to every little detail.

In 2012, before tha days of me having any knowledge of creating graphics (I still have no clue how to work with photoshop), I worked with a graphic designer to create the concept imagery for my 10 year throwback editorial movie as an inspirational target timeline.  The scripts from my real life events still remain the same to this day.  However, in 2020 I changed the name 'Forever And For Always' to 'Someday', along with creating all the new graphics myself.  The new name derives from my creative process, that is 'my relentless desire to create from my inspirations'.  No matter the timeline of my memories of those inspirations, 'someday' I always create from them.  The editorial movie will be a love story of endless hope and the relationship between my inspirations and my creativity.

Nature and the natural world is ingrained into my brand's DNA.  Improving the quality of the life I live with my belief of 'Quality over Quantity' and preserving our beautiful home planet for the generations yet to come is my actual lifestyle.  My aim is to create a completely net-zero brand.  Being transparent with every stage of the process and having traceability for all manufacturing processes from the fabrics to the printing and packaging is important for my brand's journey.  I don't claim to be perfect in any shape or form, but I am transparent at all times.  There's always room for improvements and I strive to constantly learn, innovate and improve myself on a personal level and in turn that transfers onto my brand.  Slow and ethical fashion without green washing is one of the core values of my brand.  My countryside friend's call me 'the farmer boy from the future'.

A giant foot to serve as a reminder to myself that the journey ahead is gigantic, but I'll take one step at a time.

In the past couple of years, I've unfortunately taken a backward step, due to one of the final stages of my brand transition going live with offering the full ranges, added to that, many environmentally friendly manufacturers of raw materials have been closed over the pandemic, and sadly some have had to close their doors permanently.  Currently my carbon footprint falls short by nearly 12% to being carbon neutral.  However, by the begining of 2026, I aim to hit the carbon neutral point of my journey to becoming a net-zero brand, and hopefully by 2029 become a carbon positive brand with new strategies for my trusted sceme of 'Being Kind To Planet Earth'.  I'll publish the official reports on this website, as an incentive for myself to keep striving for my goals.  From time to time, I shall invite you to take part in, and support various environmental projects that I'll be publishing during the course of this journey, and of course my once a year evening of Planet Earth, when I invite my valued customers for an indepth update and open discussions.

You can view behind the scenes into my personal life and learn more about my love for everything natural on the dedicated Nature page on this website.
To learn more about my environmental strategies, natural fabrics and fibres, please visit my Planet Earth page on this website.

There are four ranges on offer from my James Clarke Brand.  The exclusive 'JC BESPOKE' tailoring experience, which is the couture range and the once a year 'ART COLLECTION' which is the Haute Couture range.  The two other ranges are the 'MADE TO MEASURE' service and the 'READY TO WEAR' collection.  My Ready to Wear collections are limited to select number of capsule pieces per season, offered at hand selected places.  The collections are hand crafted with cotton, silks, velvets and ocean plastics.  My 'Made to Measure' service derives from the 'Ready to Wear' collection and are accessible to all.  My style is minimal, however I do offer a selection of unique prints that are printed digitally with eco friendly inks in London.

An offer of the experience for my hand made pieces of JC Bespoke and the Art Collection to individuals is reserved by me.  It's a chosen exclusivity that I extend, to offer the luxury for a limited number of pieces per year to discerning individuals.

When it comes to my relationship with science and art... I played with it, I teased myself with questions and puzzles that I had to solve, I explored it to the depths of my soul and I calculated the maths from every conceivable angle.  Finally, in 2012 I concluded that every part derives from my learnings of science and art as a child, from my grandparents and parents.  That's when I knew how to develop my already existing JC brand further, and the specific marketing strategies I needed to create for the final stage of my brand development, so I designed my own branding lab as a second studio and I got to work.  If we lived in the times where I-Robots were walking amongst us, I'd definitely build a futuristic lab and have a few I-Robots incorporated in my AI work flow, just like my artistic impression below.

Between 2012 and 2016, I devoted every spare minute I had towards developing my brand design further, with the help of AI, based more on science and maths than anything else.  Once I attained the completed formulas from my findings, I then applied my artistic vision to add the layers of my style.  In 2016, I extended my branding lab to incorporate my mood board analysis area to extract my design formulas.  Then the time came in 2017, to launch my first ever collection of JC Couture in the form of Resort Wear, followed by JC Bespoke service in 2018 and that's when the new formulas behind my branding and the entire creative process went live.

I built the entirety of my brand concept on geometry, mainly on the most stackable shapes on planet Earth; cubes and cuboids.  I also took inspirations from some aspects of the hexagon and some aspects from all the Platonic Solids.  My branding model utilises the exact bulding blocks of everything we know as humans.  How the Universe works, the science and the maths behind it, that supports not only the interactions of it, but vitally, the expansion of it.  This concept has given me growth potential that's organic and multidimensional.  I spent nearly 4 years, developing the concept of my branding, marketing and my creative process.  Upon completion of my formulas, then testing it for couple of years, I wanted to celebrate... which I did in true JC style with a cup of coffee, a cheesecake and an inspirational trip to the Indian Oceans in 2018.

For the ones who experience my creativity in the forms of the physical products and the social media, those visual elements in art forms amount to 9% of my branding.  Although this website is pretty extensive for a tiny brand like myself, it amounts to only 2% of my overall branding.  The other 89% of it happens in my lab, and it's about my brand identity and how it works behind the scenes to link the purpose of my brand to my branding and the workings of how it conveys my brand's message.  For me, the engine that drives my branding forward is armoured with the formulas of science and maths that I've formulated from my learnings and how all six dimensions fit together to make up the key elements of brand JC.  The artist impression below is from when I updated the layout design of my lab specifically for my transitional process.   Every piece of my creativity is born from a real life experience and that's combined with my inspirations to transform into designs, through my creative process.  To be able to stay true to that process, my branding and marketing formulas were a complex process, with years of developments behind those doors, so I could have the hopes of achieving the simplicity of story telling through visuals and style.

My creative space is a world full of physics, chemistry, geology, visuals, AI experiments and lots more.  In 2014, I designed this website structure in there as part of my brand design development, whilst having a steady supply of chocolate torts, cheesecakes, coffee and diet coke.  It's purpose is to highlight my brand's message rather than making quick money through product sales.  It highlights more of the happenings from behind the scenes to convey the purpose of my brand, instead of a polished look to just promote the finished products.  That's the transparency of my realness, rather than pretending that life is perfect with unicorns and fairies.  It's simple to browse for everyone who navigates it with clean lines and an easy layout without complications, but to achieve that, there are a lot of thought and complexities within the skeleton part of the structure.  I'm always striving for simplicity with style, no matter how difficult that may be to achieve.  It takes work and thoughtfulness behind the scenes, and I continue to implement the results through the creative work flow to bring my visions to life.

To convey my brand's message through the elements of authenticity that stays true to myself is one of the key points of my brand.  We are all different and unique and at the very beginning I had to figure out a brand formula that works for me, starting from the very basic questions such as, what I would like to achieve, who is my brand for, and the purpose of my brand, to where my brand positioning should be, the proposed framework for my brand's journey and many other such questions that I asked myself.  This initial process had two purpose, one was to see if I would be willing to spend the time to answer those questions, as that would highlight the level of commitment I'm willing to invest into my own brand's journey and the second was to actually have the very basic answers, so I could create the foundation levels to begin the brand design process.  And begin, I did.  It's been an amazing journey so far and I shall continue to stay true to my brand values as I look to the future filled with possibilities and style.