Nicholas Graham (born February 25, 1958) is a Canadian fashion designer, marketer and entrepreneur. Graham founded

Joe Boxer Joe Boxer (also known as Box-oh-Joes or BJ) is an American brand of underwear and related apparel founded by Nicholas Graham that focuses on novelty hanging underwear. In April 2001, the Joe Boxer brand, which was facing bankruptcy, was sold t ...

in 1985, and is the founder and CEO of the Nick Graham menswear line, and of the SpaceOne lifestyle brand.

Early life and education

Nick Graham was born in

Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, makin ...

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

, to English immigrants Ewen and Monica Graham. Graham is the third of four siblings. He attended

Trinity College School Trinity College School (TCS) is a co-educational, independent boarding and day school located in Port Hope, Ontario, Canada. TCS was founded on May 1, 1865, more than two years before Canadian Confederation. It includes a Senior School ...

Port Hope, Ontario Port Hope is a municipality in Southern Ontario, Canada, approximately east of Toronto and about west of Kingston. It is located at the mouth of the Ganaraska River on the north shore of Lake Ontario, in the west end of Northumberland County. ...

and finished high school at

Strathcona-Tweedsmuir School Strathcona-Tweedsmuir School is a private university prep school in Okotoks, Alberta, Canada. It has students in Grades K to 12, with its Grade 12 Achievement test, provincial exam scores consistently highly ranked. Strathcona-Tweedsmuir is South ...

Okotoks Okotoks (, originally ) is a town in the Calgary Region of Alberta, Canada. It is on the Sheep River, approximately south of Calgary. Okotoks has emerged as a bedroom community of Calgary. According to the 2016 Census, the town has a population ...

, Alberta. At 16, he bought a sewing machine and taught himself to sew. After high school graduation, he spent time traveling in Europe, including six months sewing dresses in Greece; he then moved on to Sweden, where he met and married his first wife, Maria Goldinger.

Joe Boxer

In 1980, Graham and Goldinger moved to San Francisco and began making unique neckties under the name Summ.

Macy's Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

was a client and a buyer there suggested that they put their designs on men's underwear; Macy's sold out the first boxer short design in three days and the company

was born. Graham became well-known for marketing concepts, such as sending

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and agai ...

100 pairs of boxer shorts on his 100th day in office, creating glow-in-the-dark underwear, and running afoul of the

United States Department of the Treasury The Department of the Treasury (USDT) is the national treasury and finance department of the federal government of the United States, where it serves as an executive department. The department oversees the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and t ...

when he silk-screened $100 bills on boxer shorts. In 1991, Graham was accepted into the

Council of Fashion Designers of America The Council of Fashion Designers of America, Inc. (CFDA), founded in 1962 by publicist Eleanor Lambert, and headquartered in Manhattan, is a not-for-profit trade association comprising a membership of over 450 American fashion and accessory des ...

. To facilitate expansion, Graham sold 20% of the company and began licensing its name and designs to other companies, for use on other products. By 1996, Graham stated that annual sales were $50 million. However, after licensing the Joe Boxer name to the New York women's lingerie company Van Mar Inc., Graham launched a competing line of underwear. Van Mar sued and won; the $3.2 million judgement threatened to bankrupt Joe Boxer. Nine months later, in September 2001, the company was sold to Windsong Allegiance Apparel Group, which signed an exclusive deal with

Kmart Kmart Corporation ( , doing business as Kmart and stylized as kmart) is an American retail company that owns a chain of big box department stores. The company is headquartered in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, United States. The company was inc ...

to sell Joe Boxer products. Graham had not been CEO for some time but had remained a partner; he continued to be involved with the company until 2005, when Joe Boxer was sold to its current owner,

Iconix Brand Group Iconix Brand Group is an American brand management company that licenses brands to retailers and manufacturers primarily in the apparel, footwear, and apparel accessory industries. Its brands are available in such stores as Kohl's, Kmart, Sear ...

. In 2019, Iconix announced that Graham had returned to Joe Boxer as a creative consultant.

Nick Graham Collection

In 2012, Graham moved to New York City and began developing the Nick Graham collection. The brand, which is a division of Tharanco Group, launched online in December 2013, and expanded into department stores in October 2014. The same month Iconix Brand Group invested in the company. The collection provided quality affordable suits, as well as the world's first 3D-printed line of accessories. With the business downturn brought on by the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

, the Nick Graham collection reduced its output to shirts, ties and shoes. In January 2020, Graham launched 'Airband', a face covering brand. In 2021, Graham launched SpaceOne, a digital apparel outlet with a space-faring aesthetic.

Other

Graham is the author of ''A Brief History Of Shorts: The Ultimate Guide To Understanding Your Underwear'' (1995). In September 2019, Graham debuted a project titled ''Soundtrack From Films Never Made''. Graham performed the production at a

New York Fashion Week New York Fashion Week (NYFW), held in February and September of each year, is a semi-annual series of events in Manhattan typically spanning 7–9 days when international fashion collections are shown to buyers, the press, and the general publ ...

after-party.

Awards

*International

Woolmark Woolmark is a wool industry certification mark used on pure wool products that meet quality standards set by The Woolmark Company. It is a trade mark owned by The Woolmark Company, which has since 2007 been a subsidiary of Australian Wool Innovatio ...

Prize (1990, 1991) *Men’s Fashion Association MARTY Award (1991) *Golden Shears Award (1991) *MIRA Award (1992) *''Earnshaw Magazine'' EARNIE Award for children’s design excellence (1994, 1995) * CLIO Award (Joe Boxer website, 1995)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Graham, Nicholas 1958 births Living people Businesspeople from Calgary Businesspeople from the San Francisco Bay Area Canadian businesspeople in fashion Canadian expatriates in the United States