In conversation with Komali and Meghan: founders of streetwear brand King’s Ransom

On a chilly Friday evening in Shoreditch, I attended a pop-up show hosted by Meghan and Komali who are the founders of King’s Ransom London a female owned streetwear brand. It has grown immensely since they started 4 years ago, and as I walked around the venue, I could sense the excitement as people admired the photography, decor and merchandise that was on display.

I got a chance to speak with the 24-year-olds Meghan and Komali about the King’s Ransom London brand, the pop-up and their journey together in Street wear fashion, from the beginning until now.

“When we looked at both our interests and talents we figured that everything that we liked collectively makes up a brand, so why not start our own?”

Meghan and Komali met 14 years ago at school and have a very close friendship. They always knew they would work together in some capacity, however, it wasn’t until they left education that these plans started to take form. “When I left college I knew I wanted to be involved in fashion, but I also knew I liked advertising” says Meghan. “Komali was very talented at art and had already started customising clothing – I still have a jumper that she made me! When we looked at both our interests and talents we figured that everything that we liked collectively makes up a brand, so why not start our own?”

For anyone, starting their own business – it’s no mean feat. Meghan and Komali were just 19-years-old when they started King’s Ransom London, and the process of starting and funding their own clothing line had its setback. Komali said “everything for this brand has been completely self-funded. In the beginning it was hard finding decent suppliers at an affordable rate. The difficulty is balancing cost effectiveness with good quality materials and items. These things take a lot of trial and error, however we really wanted to create a brand that is good quality and is worth the money you pay for it.”

Still, with every setback there is always a victory, and in a few years the girls began to see all their plans coming to fruition. Meghan says: “In our first year as an experiment we printed up 100+ t-shirts and did a social media campaign, got all our friends involved, cut a film of it and waited to see what happens. We sold out of all of those t-shirts so in our second year, Komali completely revamped the website and we did another campaign and a lookbook which really helped to establish the aesthetic of our brand. We’re now in our fourth year and have recently released our swimwear collection!”

In those four years, it was important to the girls that they established a trusted brand and put their energy into designing their brand logos. During the interview, Meghan spoke about the importance of their website and clothing being synonymous with the ethos of the brand, “I think the ethos and our branding is a very important part of what we do. We aim to champion young people who are striving to be at the top of their game. King’s Ransom itself means something of high value. It was about how we view ourselves and how we quantify success. In terms of our products, we feel there is a difference between trend and style, and what we want King’s Ransom to represent is more of a classic style, with specific pieces that we’ve researched and that we love.”

Alongside their clothing line, Meghan and Komali created the Eye of a King series, which aims to be an inclusive platform to bring together different photographers, stylists and models to share and develop their vision. Komali says, “Eye of a King started because we needed to make content for our brand and we wanted to reach out to photographers who [were] creating beautiful and stunning photography but [didn’t] necessarily have opportunities to show their work because they may not have had a large following on social media.”

“They were able to have free rein to truly capture their own individual aesthetic”

Meghan and Komali used the King’s Ransom London pop up as a platform to showcase the photography from people such as Rayvon Williams, Morgan Tedd and Tasha Brune-Goodey. For some, this was their first time ever having their work on display and during the creative process, they were able to have free rein to truly capture their own individual aesthetic. Meghan says: “Giving young people a platform is important to us, that’s what the pop-up was about. A lot of the photographers featured on the night had never had their work printed before, so we want to give them the recognition that perhaps they weren’t getting otherwise.”

All the models in the photographs were wearing items from King’s Ransom London and had a short biography giving us a little insight into their style of work. “When choosing the photographers I specifically chose photographers who had different looks or used different techniques for their work and Komali doing the interviews with them was a great way to show the general public a bit about their background and where they wish to take their careers,” says Meghan.

And Komali’s advice for the young people of today? “Overnight success doesn’t exist, it’s all about being patient and trusting the process and hoping that the hard work gets the recognition it deserves.”

In 2018 Meghan and Komali have plans to continue The Eye of a King series in order to encourage more collaboration in London’s creative industry. Founded on a friendship and a combined love and dedication to fashion and authenticity, The King’s Ransom London is sure to continue growing into the New Year, with gender-specific clothing lines available and perhaps even a men’s swimwear collection.

Click here to see more of King’s Ransom London in 2018:

Images by Azeez Bello, Alys Willcox and Roman Akira.