I run a company that 20, 15 even 10 years ago probably wouldn’t have made it this far let alone become a success. We are of course of our time. We live in a world today that because of the internet means we reach a global audience.

In the UK we have Civil partnerships & we almost have Gay marriage. In countries like the USA there are now many States that allow gay weddings. Aren’t they kind to ‘allow’ us something we have an equal right to! Anyway I digress.

The point is The BCC is here and it works, we found our niche market and you guys luckily love what we do!

So what this means is that the very kind Ladies and Gentlemen of the press are often asking me for interviews or quotes or photos of me or our bespoke garments & it’s wonderful and we enjoy it!

But I wonder how many of you read the interviews? Do you notice them on the newsstands, do you see them on line or do they go unnoticed. The Great Unread.

Now don’t get me wrong with each publication always comes a happy sway of new clients for which we are enormously grateful but I would like to offer you a little Q&A of our own. I haven’t blogged in while so I thought why not blog a Q&A.

I have asked myself questions that are frequently asked of me by the press, by clients, by interested people and I have answered them honestly & in way that I hope you will enjoy. So here goes. All comments gratefully received in the blog comment box! Promise we will read them

What is a butch woman?
Butches are women. Women who identify proudly as butch are many things, multi faceted. Many would say we are very best of both genders; at least that’s what I tell my wife. But from our perspective (The BCC) they are women who choose to wear men’s style clothing.

Why start The Butch Clothing Company?
I personally was so tired of having to purchase ill fitting men’s suits & so realising I wasn’t alone in this & recognising the fact that butches are women, who do choose to wear men’s clothing, is exactly what led me to found the company back in the summer of 2009. We spent an intense 10 months in research and development to work out how we could produce perfectly fitted suits based on classic males styles and the latest male fashion trends. The company was set up for all gay women not just those that identify as ‘butch’ but, you see, by calling the company The Butch Clothing Clothing Company every gay women in the world could and does recognise that we are company for her. Of course providing she doesn’t want a feminine suit.

Has it been a challenge setting up the Company?
The first challenge was to find a manufacturing partner and team of tailors that understood the concept of the brand and offered ethical responsible business. Challenge two was of course the fit, traditionally as butch women we have had to purchase male suits which although look great on the peg in reality the fit to woman is often poor, with oversized shoulder pads, way too much excess crotch room, arm length way to long the list endless. So we had to, through some internal construction and a very specific measurement process, find a successful way of creating suits that on the outside look like a male suit but also fit to perfection

How have your target market liked the brand?
This is a niche market and the company was always going to be a slow grower but over 3 years it has done exactly that, grow. The global support from gay women around the world has been amazing. To date we have had over 60,000 unique hits on our website, over 1000 members on our mailing list and 1500+ followers on the company Facebook page. We receive dozens of inquiries daily. We have posted some testimonials on our website and Facebook page which shows how delighted both our UK face to face clients and our global video Skype clients have been to date. Like I say the business just gets stronger month by month.

Is it only wedding attire that gay women want?
No definitely not. Our clients proudly come from all walks of life. They buy suits yes for their weddings and Civil Partnerships of course, but also for work and for social occasions, we even have groups of sports women who want team blazers. It’s all good and it’s all go!

Are women choosing suits with you following a trend?
There are no trends that we can acknowledge. What we have learnt is that everybody does it in their own way. If we had to pin point common ground it would be that 95% of those getting married do want a 3 piece suit (jacket, trousers & waistcoat) with a nice crisp white shirt and often hold the theme of their wedding colours in their choice of cravat, pocket square for the top pocket of the jacket and cufflinks. We do of course offer all these accessories too.

Any advice for perspective ‘Brooms’ – Butch Grooms?
From a bespoke tailoring perspective I always say to my clients buying a bespoke suit is an investment, an investment not only in your wedding day but an investment in you for your future. Our suits will last you happily for the next 15 years so when we design the perfect suit with you let’s think about the colours you like, the fabrics your are drawn to, how it will work with all elements already in your wardrobe, we encourage clients to think about mixing up the suit after the wedding by wearing the jacket with jeans, the waistcoat with shorts, the trousers with other shirts. We say use it, wear it, enjoy it. And from one married butch to an about to be married butch I say always be nice to your wife, if she’s anything like mine she’s the one who’s got your back !

It’s an interesting concept blogging!
But only truly great if people are prepared to discuss what you blog…hmmmm dilemma time
Ok here goes…If you own a company that tailors suits for gay women, and you offer lesbian clothing, clothes for lesbians, clothes for gay women getting married, butch clothing, you are certainly in a niche market regardless of labels!
You are certainly in a market that needs labels and not just those on your garments. How do you identify yourself to the rest of the world as a gay company, a company that is here for gay women however they may identify.
I think our client testimonials and client images in our gallery page reflect the wide variety of women who have come to us looking for a suit. You don’t have to be butch to design and purchase from us, you don’t have to be English to design and purchase from us, but what is fantastic is that you do have to be gay! No I’m joking, you don’t HAVE to be gay, of course not, but the point is we are here for you, the gay women of the world!
These days many gay women get married globally and it’s pretty hard for those of us not into ‘frocks’ to be able to find the perfect wedding outfit that fits!
Now you must understand creating a wedding suit for a gay woman (no matter how they identify) is a challenge, but proudly I state it’s a challenge The BCC has risen to. We have to date, had in excess of 100 clients worldwide, now 100 clients may not sound like a lot but think of it this way. Since the dawn of time there have been gay women, for hundreds of years these gay women had to dress to conform, then, god bless the likes of non conformists like Radcliffe Hall who gave so many the courage to look for a new way to dress to reflect who they were. Yet even when gay women stood upright and proud and decided that a lesbian could and should where men’s style suits what happened? Well let me tell you, the world, through the 60’s 70’s definitely the 80’s, 90’s and 00’s said ok you wear these men’s suits if you must. So we did!
And we shopped in departments stores, and men’s tailoring establishments and renowned hire stores and what happened? Well we would got called ‘Sir’ or asked ‘Madam is this for your husband’ (well the more feminine among us) and when they realised we weren’t ‘Sir’ and we definitely didn’t have a husband they either ignored us hoping we would disappear or often in a dismissive half hearted fashion, they would assist us to purchase an ill fitting catastrophe that would on occasions be almost comedic!
Now this happened year in year out in the UK, in the USA, in Australia, in Asia, in Europe, you name the place it happened. So millions upon millions of gay women looking for that perfect suit consistently settled for second best.
Now this is where we come in…Decades after Radcliffe Hall, decades after homosexuality became legal, even a decade or so after being a lesbian became socially acceptable, The Butch Clothing Company arrived!
But wow reaching out to all those suit wearing gay women in the world is a challenge. Now I read somewhere on line recently that they estimate there are 9 million gay people in the US alone now if we average half of those as being lesbian that puts us with a potential niche market state side of 4.5 million women.
In the UK a recent national newspaper claimed that the gay population in the UK reaches 6% that’s 3.6 million people. That’s maybe 3% gay women, a 1.8 million lesbian marketplace.
So a niche market in the UK and US combined represents a figure of perhaps 6.3 million people!
Question is how do we tell this wonderful demographic of these two countries, and beyond, that finally there is a company who shares their experience, was born from their experience, that offers one on one consultations to allow you to design and create the most perfectly fitted suit you could previously only ever dreamt of owning?
Well the answer is you try hard, you try hard to spread the word, you use marketing (even on a limited budget) you embrace social media and you just keep trying, you ask everyone to put a link to your website on their website, you ask everyone to tell everyone they know. You write blogs which you hope will encourage people to tell more people. And then maybe just maybe one day all those 6.3 million people (or a lot of them) will have heard the name The Butch Clothing Company!
So that’s my blog for this month and that’s why we blog…if you read it, if you liked it, please write a comment, hey even if you didn’t like it write a comment. And if you would like to see The BCC reach so much wider than it’s 100 clients, it’s 50,000 unique website hits, it’s 150 twitter followers and its 850 Facebook followers please link us to your webpage, come ‘LIKE’ us on Facebook, follow us on twitter, tell your friends we are here or best of all come book a face to face or video Skype consultation no matter where in the world you are and come get probably the most perfect suit you will ever own!

Traditionally it would seem, May to September, certainly in the Western world, is wedding season. In U.K. gay marriage was legalized in 2005 however 2011 has been the busiest year to date, at least from my vantage point as director of The Butch Clothing Company.

I have a plethora of clients, the majority of whom are marrying between now and next February. Which begs the question, Is wedding season now all year round? Let’s hope so, let’s make it so!

In so many parts of the world gay marriage is legal; if not legal then the coming together of same-sex couples to declare their love and commitment seems seldom frowned upon. So we have paved the way for marriage, marriage in many forms, many styles, many places.

I myself indulged in the art of marriage when I married the stunningly beautiful Mrs. Riley on May 14. The sun shone, my bride wore the most wonderful ivory dress, all the guests showed up, and the seven small bridesmaids all behaved.

Mrs R and I went for a traditional wedding in a very beautiful Spa hotel in Tunbridge Wells, a quaint Kentish Town, complete with ceremony, Pimms reception, wedding breakfast with an amazing wedding singer, and an evening full of magic, music, swing and the first dance (10 weeks of lessons to produce a nerve-wracking social foxtrot to “Fly Me to the Moon”).

Our wedding was very personal to us; we chose tradition because we could, Sue chose a gorgeous dress and I, of course, chose a 3-piece suit, more on that later. However, I meet many couples on the eve of marriage who all see their day so differently.

I have clients that want the top hat and tails, morning suits/dinner suits or 3-piece suits; they want velvet or linen, or the “Ellen” wedding outfit with crisp white shirt, cream vest, and matching cream pants. They sometimes want to dress all members of the wedding party female/male/ butch/femme/best men/worst women—it’s as unique as the wedding itself.

I went for a charcoal grey herringbone 3-piece, with a textured burgundy striped lining, with a traditional peaked collar, 3 buttons and contrast stitch detail to match the lining on the button holes on the collar, cuff and trouser pockets. I even indulged in wonderful silver piping on the inside of the suit lining which complemented the burgundy stripe to perfection. I matched my suit with a white shirt, stylish cuff links, an engraved money clip, a white hankie, a silk burgundy cravat and a matching burgundy pocket square for my top pocket in my jacket. My button hole was filled with a white Avalanche rose. The theme color for our wedding was burgundy and white so I and my best man, my brother, and Sue’s brother all complemented the bridesmaids, the flowers and even the room decoration. It was masterfully planned and looked fantastic.

But all couples are different. When choosing our wedding attire let’s not look at what’s been before or what should be, let’s look at what we actually want.

What’s right for you? Maybe no one wants a dress; maybe no one wants a suit. But if a suit or vest and pants is right for one or both of you, I urge you to consider all the elements that will make your day complete and then naturally you will find the answers. I mean, if you’re marrying on a beach or in a romantic field you may want a light linen you can wear with sandals. If you are making a commitment or a blessing in a church then you may want a formal, dashing suit, or imagine a sophisticated evening affair at a high end venue—you may consider a delightfully stylish satin, shawl collar, black dinner suit.

But it is equally important to remember no two people have to look the same at any wedding—not even the two people getting married, just as neither has to take the other’s name or even become Mrs., as I have chosen not to do. Being legally married doesn’t mean there are any wedding rules to adhere to.
Weddings are as individual as our personalities. Mrs Riley and I are attending three weddings over the next three weekends, as none of the guests will be at all three weddings I have opted to wear my fantastic suit to all three nuptials. Now while my wife chose a most magnificent dress, this dress was not inexpensive, and is “a one day wear only” frock! Unless we attend a Miss Haversham party (Dickens fans will get that reference) she is unlikely to ever show the beautifully constructed dress the light of day again. However when buying your wedding suit you know for sure it’s going to have literally hundreds of outings.

Our suits aren’t cheap; the nature of bespoke tailoring isn’t cheap. But I tell all my clients when investing in a suit particularly for your wedding to think about the versatility of the suit after your big day. Choose colors and fabrics you love, choose linings and detailing that will work with many different shirts, shorts, even shoes. Think about how your wedding vest for example, would look great with your favorite pair of jeans. Just because a suit is formal it doesn’t mean post wedding you can’t dress it down. T-shirts with smart pants, jackets with shorts—the list is endless.

But remember also, the main thing for anyone on their wedding day is to feel incredible, to feel on top of the world. What you wear and how you accessorize your wedding outfit is a major part of the day for both of you. This is one of these most important days of your life. Trust me, it’s worth every penny but I ask you, if you invest in a suit, invest wisely, invest for your future.