Built To Last
Finnieston Clothing, the Glasgow menswear company celebrating the city’s heritage
FASHION maybe isn’t the first thing that springs to mind when you think of the Glasgow shipyards. In the early 1900s, a fifth of all ships in the world were made in the famous yards on the Clyde, and the term “Clydebuilt” became synonymous with high-quality workmanship.
However, you wouldn’t expect to find high-end fashion among the outputs of the industrial smoke and steelworks.
That is, until Glasgow-born designer Ross Geddes saw a gap in the market. He wanted to celebrate Glasgow’s industrial heritage within his new business, Finnieston Clothing.
Ross comes from a fashion background – his parents own and run the CCW Clothing chain, based in Callander – and in 2018 he took the plunge and started his own fashion business.
“I saw a large gap in the market for a clothing brand which is actually from Glasgow,” Ross says. “There are some great Scottish brands, but in Glasgow there’s not a lot of competition.” After their first season of selling clothes, Ross decided to do more to represent Glasgow’s famous industrial history through his products.
“If you really want to grow a brand you have to give the brand its own identity. There’s a really strong industrial heritage in Glasgow and I felt we should push that way, which lends itself to menswear.”
Ross teamed up with shipbuilding expert and author Ian Johnston to steer Finnieston Clothing’s collection, Clydebuilt, forward.
“Ian has thousands of old pictures of the Clydeside in his attic, and looking at them I started to see little details like old shipping company logos – old school retro logos that would look good on a T-shirt.”
It was from there that Ross knew he was on to a winner. He began sourcing quality local materials for Finnieston’s Clydebuilt jackets to reflect the hallmark of excellence once bestowed on Glasgow’s ships.
“There’s a pressure where you’re trying to represent such an amazing industrial heritage,” Ross says. “If you’re going to have that mantra of ‘Clydebuilt’, you have to build items of clothing that will last the test of time, you can’t just bring out a pile of rubbish!”
As a small business intending to grow their customer base, the quality of the garments is especially important to Finnieston. Luckily, the feedback has been brilliant, with people of all ages really invested in the range.
“You’ve got guys who used to work at the shipyards, you’ve got younger guys whose grandfathers used to work there, we’ve made it relevant to a lot of people.”
Finnieston Clothing’s greatest success has been representing individual companies that once made their name on the banks of the Clyde, including John Brown & Company. Since this line of T-shirts was introduced, Ross has been inundated with messages about which shipbuilding company will be represented next.
“You have to build items of clothing last” that will
“People are asking ‘when are you doing Yarrow?’ and ‘when are you doing this?’ It’s really nice to know you’ve got these people who are waiting in the wings for us to bring out new items.”
While new garments may be on the cards, that’s not all Ross has planned for the future of Finnieston Clothing. As an online business, it can be difficult to convince potential customers to make clothing purchases without trying the garment on, so Ross has recently opened a shop on Byres Road, Glasgow.
“I’ve never bought a jacket I haven’t tried on and so it’s quite hard for a new brand like myself to sell £300 jackets directly to people online.
“We’ll hopefully continue to stay in Byres Road.
If you buy that jacket in-store, then it’s more easy to buy from that brand again online after that because you are familiar with the quality and the fit.”
With a retail store checked off the list, Ross has some even bigger plans in mind.
“My main dream is to have my own factory in Scotland. There are some great small Scottish manufacturers but for them to make stuff for me to then sell on to the customer meant that the retail price is pushed up quite a bit to cover costs.
“I would love to do up an old abandoned warehouse in Glasgow, have a little factory in there, a factory shop, a beautiful café and restaurant and a tiny little shopping centre where lots of smaller independent businesses can come and thrive.”
For a relatively new clothing brand, Finnieston Clothing has maturity beyond its years – looking to the future to support Scottish business, while their feet are set firmly in Glasgow’s glorious industrial past.
“There are a lot of really great small businesses in Scotland,” Ross says. “I think it would be something really quite special if you could bring these people under one roof, that’s something I would love to do, to celebrate Scottish brands.”
“We have customers waiting in the wings items” for new