Sean Brown is a multidisciplinary creative and cultural archivist. His approach to reimagining the future of product development and design is informed by a broad referential vocabulary, underpinned by a desire to show equal reverence to non-traditional and institutionally acknowledged artifacts of importance.

An early exploration of fashion illustration proved a gateway to honing his appreciation of silhouette and form, leading to a curatorial perspective that became the foundation of his 2010 conceptual luxury vintage retail space, The Art Of Reuse. An opportunity to bring this pop-up retail experience to several notable North American markets intensified Sean’s love of travel which would become a recurring theme intrinsic to his practice ideologically and in the tangible form of future brand collaborations.

2013 saw Brown launch his elevated take on sportswear with his NEEDS&WANTS label. The line was accompanied by a biannual publication of the same name, providing lifestyle context embodying the spirit in which the clothing was conceived. His discerning eye used the pages to frame the sensibilities of his NEEDS&WANTS consumer in the areas of design, travel, architecture, and flora to name a few. An immersive and multi-sensory consumer activation in a repurposed 8ft x 20ft shipping container was well received as a fully actualized embodiment of the brand.

In 2015 Brown’s multi-hyphenate nous led him to an inevitable role at the intersection of music and imagery, becoming musician Daniel Caesar’s creative director In partnership with Keavan Yazdani. The brief was a utilitarian one with Sean’s duties touching on visual media, styling, and art direction. Under Brown’s creative stewardship, Caesar’s career simultaneously reached new heights culminating in a 2018 Grammy Award while Sean gained acknowledgment in the form of an Audience Award at the 2018 Prism Prize Award show for his contributions to Caesar’s “Freudian, A Visual”. Brown also received a Juno Awards nomination for Album Artwork Of The Year.

In July of 2018, Sean Brown announced his arrival in the world of fine art at the Peter MacKendrick Gallery in Toronto with his inaugural solo show entitled “Curves”. An interactive showing including a collection of photo essays and objects, “Curves” sought to reverse engineer Brown’s creative process providing an open-source glimpse into his work across disciplines by revealing source material presented in a way to comprise the show itself. The second and third installations of Curves were held at the Letter Bet in Montreal and at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, respectively.

During the pandemic of 2020, Brown’s insatiable desire to create saw an explosion in popularity for his first foray into the home goods space. Retaining the name “Curves”, the brand’s mission is simple. Democratization of access to tasteful interior design in a typically elitist and exclusionary space. The objects are an amalgam of Brown’s viewpoints articulated in expressions of colour study, form, and unconventional materials. The wildly popular rugs which replicate iconic CD albums have developed a ubiquitous presence on social media while Curves is now carried by select retailers including online fashion giant SSENSE and venerable London department store, Selfridges.

What’s next for Sean Brown? With 2022 seeing an ever-increasing number of digital and print cover stories and media coverage including a New York Times feature, his career trajectory is in steep ascendancy. Brands in the luxury sphere including RIMOWA and Jean Paul Gaultier can now be counted as collaborators. Future projects include a tentatively titled print publication aimed to disrupt the documentation of people’s homes. His architectural design endeavour HYPATIA communicates his vision for dwelling with a deeply considered approach to design, fostering a harmonious  symbiosis between human and environment with an emphasis on wellness of the mind and spirit.

“No one is going to give you license to use your imagination or prevent you from copying what already exists; that’s (y)our creative responsibility. To find and add truth to what already exists, you develop alternative approaches to what has been done, or discover what has yet to be done.”—Sean Brown