At 17 years old, Israel McCorkle started a fashion brand with a vision far beyond just designing clothes. He started a fashion brand that became McCorklen, a Black-owned American fashion house and retro lifestyle brand founded in 2024. Now 19, McCorkle is documenting the brand’s journey as he works to grow McCorklen from a young fashion brand into a major global fashion house with a legacy that lasts.
McCorklen isn’t just any typical new fashion brand, it’s rooted in 1970s style, hippie culture, boho fashion, and American retro influences. McCorklen brings together fashion, denim, handbags, accessories, art, runway collections, music, rap culture, and also has an original type of handbag style called the “Pill Bag.” At the center of the brand is its signature message: “Story of a Boy — Be Who You Wanna Be.”
Building From the Ground Up
McCorkle began promoting and selling McCorklen handbags locally, online, and around his school. With limited resources, he relied on word of mouth, personal connections, and direct promotion to introduce people to his unique pill bag design.
As the brand developed, so did McCorkle’s vision. He began documenting the process — showing what it is like to build a fashion company at a young age, develop new products, create a recognizable identity, and turn a brand into an actual world.
One design that became an important part of that journey is the original Pill Bag. Its wide, rounded capsule shape gives it a distinctive appearance compared with traditional square or tote handbags. Designed for both style and everyday use, the bag features interior space and pockets while maintaining its structured silhouette.
Aiming to Build a Global Fashion House
McCorkle’s long-term vision is to expand McCorklen into a large-scale fashion house — one that can exist across multiple areas of fashion and culture rather than being known for only one product.
The future vision includes continuing to develop clothing, handbags, footwear, headwear, accessories, runway collections, and other creative projects while building McCorklen into a recognizable American fashion name.
For McCorkle, the process itself is part of McCorklen’s story. From starting the brand at 17 to documenting its growth at 19 and years on, each product, and collection becomes another part of the journey toward the larger fashion house he hopes McCorklen will become.
