Since Disturbia Clothing was founded in 2003, it has grown into a behemoth of alternative fashion. Worn by the likes of Guns N Roses’ axeman Slash as well as Liam Howlett of The Prodigy, it now proudly supplies over 150 stores across Europe with its bold’re-evaluations of the everyday world’.
Created by fashion graduate Frank Major, as an outlet for his anarchic musings, the art of Disturbia is inspired by a love of subverting pop culture imagery coupled with fitting wordplay, and an underlying dark sense of humour. Initially creating all the designs himself, of late Disturbia has painstakingly sought out the best alternative artists to give each collection a mutli-faceted appeal. Last year Frank also designed 3 exclusive limited edition t shirts for The Prodigy which sold out within a matter of days.
We recently caught up with frank to ask him a few questions
Rocksins: So what got you into t-shirt design?
Frank: I started Disturbia in 2003 after graduating from a fashion degree from the university of Northumbria. At uni I was predominantly interested in textile design, so applying these graphics to t-shirts seemed like the most natural and marketable progression. I’ve also been slightly obsessed with t-shirts, and I think this stems from the cool shirts I used to see and buy at gigs in the early nineties.
Rocksins: How easy was it getting into clothing design?
Frank: Well training for 4 years at university certainly helped learn about the business and marketing side of things, so everything kind of came from that.
Rocksins: Whats your favourite item of clothing you produce?
Frank: I love our tees, and they’re our bread and butter, but I also love developing new styles. For example, I’m working on some new cut and sew pieces at the moment, and that’s always exciting, as my goal was always to ultimately produce a full clothing line, and not just tees.
Rocksins: What was it like finding out slash and the prodigy were wearing your clothing?
Frank: It wasn’t a surprise, as we sent them some tees, but it is a great feeling knowing they really dig what we do.
Rocksins: Whats the process you go through in designing a t-shirt, do you start out with a set peice in mind or just draw and see what happens?
Frank: When ideas arrive I scribble them down in my notebook, and usually forget about them, and move onto the next. Then after a while I’ll come back to them to decide which artist would be most apt to bring this to life. Then after a process of sketches, the design gets inked. I then receive the artwork and prepare films for screen printing, and them the sampling process begins. Once we’re happy with the sampling, ie print size, colours etc, the design will be ok’ed to to be part of our next line, and will eventually end up online. Et voila!
Rocksins: What does the philosophy ‘Disturb the Suburbs’ mean to you?
Frank: The name Disturbia is a portmanteau of the words ‘disturb’ and ‘suburbia’, so it’s pretty apt.
Our graphics demand a double-take and can be pretty twisted, so our tag line sums the whole ethic up well.
check out Disturbia Clothing over at: https://www.disturbiaclothing.co.uk/
