I love cigars and the relaxing place they take me to. I have done so for years. I started this line of clothing by accident, really. It began as an idea with a bumper sticker that simply stated: Real Men Smoke Cigars. I thought it was a cool statement to help promote a domain name I own: www.CelebrateCigars.com. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with the site but I pushed forward.
Being a passionate cigar smoker but not brand loyal to any one in particular, I felt that this statement covered the action and not the brands. I took the bumper sticker concept to the next level when I realized that the shirts I do for my own business self-promotions, that are elaborately embroidered, would work great with this concept but with some alterations to fit the cigar lifestyle.
I have not found an adequate TRUE cigar shirt so I decided to design a line to fit the 24-64 year old men who have different tastes in shirts.
A pocket shirt is the basis of the clothing but many times when you have several cigars in your top pocket, they fall over sloppily and it doesn't look very nice. Therefore, our left chest pocket is sewn vertically to neatly fit two cigars upright.
The other element that I wanted to incorporate came from today's shirt designs having been influenced by the mixed martial arts exposure as well as other designers. The designs being some crazy graphic that wraps around the front to the back and so on. I wanted a simple graphic that looked elegant, yet had a sense of freedom and purpose. The dual dragons graphic on the back of the shirts does just that and the shield shows the initials of RMSC. Dragons breathe fire and cigar smokers look like they are doing the same.
The concept was solid with the graphic.
The final element to the shirt that was needed was designed after the first round of shirts were completed. At a cigar event, my friend kept putting the lighter and cutter down the cigar pocket. Every time that I asked him for the lighter, he kept having trouble fishing it out. He should have put it in his pants pocket I wondered. I then made a decision to make the Accessory PocketTM on each of the shirts just big enough to store a metal cutter and average metal lighter. I didn't want to create a Guayabera sized pocket, as these tend to bubble out when you put things in them as well as weigh the shirts down. The Accessory PocketTM is meant to be, sort of, hidden on your hip and in the same color. A small button keeps everything in place and there is no need to be pulling your shirt up and dig into your pockets for anything while you are smoking a cigar. All you need is an easy place to access your spare cigar, lighter and cutter. In fact, the pocket is perfect for business cards as well.
I hope you enjoy my line of shirts as much as I have enjoyed creating them for us Cigar Enthusiasts. Email me and let me know what you think. Send me pics of you enjoying cigars in my shirts and I will post them.
Sincerely, Jorge Luis Molina
