Indie Spotlight: King Noir
HUCK meets the boutique t-shirt brand celebrating tattoos, punk rock and skate art.
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In recent years, the UK has seen a huge rise in streetwear brands. The centre stage of this hub, of course, is London, where countless young artists and designers flock to work their way into an industry brimming with talent. Standing out from this metropolitan crowd is King Noir, a youthful t-shirt company that is bringing something fresh to a scene that can feel quite stagnant at times.
With a passion for not only moneymaking but for the art itself, King Noir was started in late 2009 by Thomas Gilmour, a former graphic design student from Slough who dropped out to play in a hardcore band, and Lawrence Gumm, who works at a post-production company after moving to London from Nairobi, Kenya. It came about when the two were talking in the pub about brands they liked and realised there weren’t really any brands in the UK that were creating tattoo-inspired clothing in a tasteful way.
“The tattoo thing came from the very first time I can remember meeting my grandfather whose tattoos represented his life in the Scots Guards,” says Lawrence, who himself has many a respected artist’s work on his skin. “I was fascinated by the fact they were a piece of living, breathing art.”
“I came up with the crown logo first then we wanted to go for a name that would sum up old London and the darker imagery of tattooing that we both aspired to,” explains Tom. “We wanted to create tasteful artwork inspired by tattoos, skateboard art and punk rock and put them on good quality shirts.” This commitment to quality sees them printing only onto 100% organic cotton shirts.
It didn’t take long for them to get noticed with such bands as Parkway Drive, Cancer Bats and Everytime I Die all sporting the brand on their respected tours. “To know that people you respect have a mutual respect for what you do is amazing,” says Tom of such endorsements.
All things King Noir are created out of a studio in Lawrence’s house in Finsbury Park, North London. Well, the studio itself is more of a lone desk, where the designs are created with the aid of a light-box, Macbook and iMac. “We both research tattoos, blogs, photos and drawings all the time,” says Tom of the partnership. “Then once a week we sit and brainstorm concepts and I sketch ideas that we keep in a black book. So we have a few books of ideas that we can pick and choose from for all upcoming releases.”
Despite their small setting, there’s a real energy about them, a work ethic that implies if you work hard enough at something you will see the results - something they saw within eight months of starting when Parkway Drive approached them to do some designs for them. They also put a lot of effort into DIY advertising. “We wanted to get noticed by fans that would be into the whole concept of the brand and not just the product, so sticker bombing always seems to attract creative and interesting people,” says Tom. If you’ve ever perused the streets of East London there’s no doubt you’ve clocked eyes on their crown logo stuck to a lamppost or two.
King Noir remains a part-time venture with Lawrence still working in post-production while Tom gets by on freelance work. But this year holds some pretty big plans with them both aiming to go full time on the brand and securing a proper studio/shop. “We have tons going on although the biggest thing will be a collaboration we will be releasing that will be a jaw dropper,” concludes Tom, not giving away too many details.
Looks like you’re going to have to keep your eyes peeled.
The humble studio.
Tom working on a new design.
One of their many creations.
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Indie Spotlight: King Noir (text) by Connor O'Brien is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
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