Viva Brighton September 2015 Issue #31

its and bobs
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on the buses:
spread the word
#5 Ben Sherman (No 12A)
Illustration by Joda, jonydaga.weebly.com
There was a time
when Ben Sherman
worked as ‘a
waiter who serenaded
the evening
customers with a
variety of songs,’
according to the
brand’s historian,
Paolo Hewitt.
Back then, Sherman
was still Arthur Sugarman, an expat Brit seeking
wealth in America.
He was born in Brighton, where his parents ran a
sweet shop and later a pawn shop. Too ambitious
to merely carry on the family business, Sugarman
moved to America in 1946, aged 20. In the following
seven years, he went through two marriages and
various jobs, including salesman and tobacco picker.
His third wife, Ruth, was the daughter of a successful
clothing entrepreneur, who hired Sugarman and
subsequently taught him ‘every aspect of the business’.
The young protégé found the company’s shirt
designs ‘too conservative’, and was ‘bored and frustrated’,
Hewitt writes.
Brought back to Brighton in 1961 by news of his
mother’s serious illness, he set up a factory at 21
Bedford Square, initially ‘making shirts for other
companies,’ a former employee later recalled. ‘He
slowly, very slowly, started to introduce odd samples
and bits and pieces he wanted to do. That’s how it
all started.’
His shirts developed such cachet among mods that
Sherman was later described, by a Brighton Museum
pamphlet, as ‘the Mod God’. In the mid-70s, the
firm’s website notes, ‘bad health meant he sold the
company and retired to Australia’. He died in 1987.
Further reading: Paolo Hewitt - My Favourite Shirt
Young Cody Clarke, of Sydney’s Watsons Bay,
takes in July’s issue of Viva Brighton – and news
of the British summer - whilst the winter sun sets
over the harbour. Carry on taking Viva wherever
you go and, via hello@vivamagazines.com, help
us spread the word…
brighton art fair offer
Over 100 artists exhibit at Brighton Art Fair.
To get your 2-4-1 ticket voucher, email your
name and address to 241@brightonartfair.co.uk
by Monday 21 Sept and you’ll shortly be sent
a voucher in the post. Private View tickets for
Thursday, 24th September (6pm - 8.30pm), will
be available online for £10 and include an exhibitor
catalogue in the ticket price. Early bird tickets
are available online for £5.50. Tickets on the
door will cost £6.50 per person (children under
14 free). brightonartfair.co.uk
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