Crossgar man launches range of faith T-shirts

Crossgar man launches range of faith T-shirts

22 August 2018

T-SHIRTS inspired by the Mysteries of the Holy Rosary are to be unveiled by a Crossgar man ahead of Pope Francis’ visit to Dublin this weekend.

Mark Canavan has used the Catholic Church’s most popular prayer in his new faith-based clothing brand, All Embracing Apparel.

The 38 year-old, from Crossgar, will sell his clothing at the Congress exhibition of the World Meeting of Families 2018, which runs from today until Friday in the RDS.

Tens of thousands of Catholics are estimated to visit the Congress to take part in workshops, daily celebration of the Eucharist, cultural events, musical performances.

The range of T-shirts, polo shirts and sweatshirts for men and women have wording such as Glorious, Sorrowful, and Luminous.

There’s also T-shirts with images of Our Lady and Jesus with the word ‘Bruh’ underneath.

The tops are all made in organic cotton and the packaging is made from recyclable cardboard.

Mark told the Recorder that when he launched his clothing line last year, he wanted to create “a brand with 

a conscience”.

“I specialise in branding and I wanted to use my skills to do something for myself so I went about creating this faith brand to try and influence the culture in a more subtle and appealing way,” said the designer and CGI artist.

“I suppose it all stems from the way my faith has been portrayed in the media, and sometimes rightly, for things have been done by some priests over the years but I struggle with the way that it’s portrayed as you don’t hear about all the positive work that is carried out in parishes and some fantastic Catholic charities.

“What I’m doing is all for a better world as we are all connected and that’s why I feel we should all be coming together instead of creating division which we seem to become very good at.”

As a father of four children under the age of six, Mark says that he wanted to create something subtle that would appeal to younger people.

“I thought about the brand 11 Degrees, which is modelled by Gaz Beadle from Geordie Shore, and how popular it is,” said Mark.

“I thought that these guys are running about TV and that’s what kids are looking up to but when my kids get older I want them to look up to something that has a better ethos.

“I’m thinking that this might influence them or it could be something that they might buy when they get older.”

While Mark is a practising Catholic, he believes that his clothing can appeal to anyone of faith.

Referring to his T-shirt wording, he says: “To me, it’s the Luminous Mystery of the Rosary but the artist side of me is also just playing with words. 

“Americans have bought some of the shirts from the site and they may or may not know what it actually refers to. It’s almost like song lyrics, the words can mean different things to different people.”

Mark enlisted the help of friend and fellow Darragh Cross GAC team-mate Mattie Hardy and model Claire Gunn for a photo-shoot at Tyrella beach which appears on www.allembracing.net.

The T-shirts are also sold through the Etsy website for handmade and craft items.