"My Mother, Philomena, has always pushed me to pursue my artistic passions and to take advantage of the good fortune we have had in coming to this country which has enabled our family to live the American dream and for me to create PAX PHILOMENA.” - Jean Marie Clarke
Jean Marie Clarke, founder of PAX PHILOMENA, is on a mission to share her life-long love and passion for beautiful textiles through
this transnational clothing line. A quintessential citizen of the world, Jean Marie was born in Calcutta, India to Anglo-Indian parents, whose families had been living in India for five generations. She immigrated with her family to America at a young age as a British citizen and was raised in Phoenix, Arizona. As the daughter of immigrants, she could not afford to buy clothes deemed “fashionable,” so she tailored and sewed her own clothing from original fabrics. Earning a scholarship to Princeton University, Jean Marie felt a calling to study art history, focusing on Italian Renaissance studies. She studied abroad in Rome, learned Italian, and fell in love with the sense of aesthetics that permeates the Italian culture. After graduation, she met Antonio Ratti the owner of Ratti SPA Textile Mill in Como, Italy. Impressed with her passion for textiles, Ratti hired her to work from his Como office designing and selling printed fabrics for the American luxury home furnishings market. For the last two decades, Jean Marie has travelled the world representing European textile mills. However, always feeling a calling to India, she has finally stepped foot back on Indian soil and has created PAX PHILOMENA to combine her love of India and Italy with her passion for beauty, color, design, and comfort in clothing.
