It all began three years ago when Newry man Brian Irwin was looking for a 1960 Down jersey, the first year the county won the All Ireland football championship. No matter where he looked, he couldn't find one.

Although there has been a massive demand for retro soccer jerseys . . . mainly through TOFFS [The old Fashioned Football Shirt Company], who produce versions of classic soccer jerseys from the Premiership and overseas . . . Irwin could not find any classic GAA jerseys anywhere.

"TG4 were showing the GAA Gold games which I thought were fantastic, " explains Irwin. "I'd always remember the stories you'd hear about such and such a final, who was a great player and all the wee stories and that. I just thought to myself 'God I'd prefer that Tipperary 1920 jersey to that 1967 Manchester United jersey, why can't I get it?'" Through contacts in the fashion trade the retired civil servant was able to get some designs made and thought it might be feasible to have the jerseys manufactured himself. He conducted a survey during last year's championship and got a great response, "from the ordinary person who was going to the football match, who's interested in the game."

"I just decided, right, to hell with it, I'm just going to have a go at it and see how it goes, " says Irwin.

Irwin set up a website in March and also sells through a number of shops nationwide. Despite only trading for six months, he has been pleasantly surprised by the response, although he is hoping to get more fashion shops interested.

"I see them as much as a fashion item as a sporting item, I don't see them as a football jersey you would actually wear on a pitch, " he says.

"They are retro-fashion items, that's what we are trading at."

The jerseys are designed from scratch using books, websites, old match programmes and first-hand accounts.

"I'm 99% sure we've got the jerseys down to a tee, " he explains. "Some people and shopkeepers were saying to me that the Dublin 1921 jersey is the wrong colour, it's too light a shade of blue, it's not the sky-blue that we have now, but I wanted it to stay authentic, that's what I'm in the market to do, to offer people the real thing.

At present the company has jerseys and tracksuit tops from 15 counties, with another three (Mayo 1989, Offaly 1982, Dublin 1987) coming on stream in the next few months. The biggest seller is the Dublin 1983 jersey but as counties go well the demand changes. This summer the Kilkenny 1933 and the Meath 1988 jerseys have sold well while there is always a big demand from Cork.

Irwin has also noticed that people are not buying just because of their own county loyalties. "I'm finding that people are buying something like the Meath 1988 jersey because it's a lovely jersey or because of the memory of a good player like Mick Lyons or Colm O'Rourke, " he says.

The aim by next year's championship is to have upwards of 24/25 counties covered but, as Irwin admits, it's more a question of what jerseys to leave out than to produce.

Through the website, fans can make suggestions as to what jerseys the company should design. Irwin is inundated with requests providing a great insight into the powerful memories and emotions the jerseys can invoke in ordinary fans.

"We get emails regarding every county, saying my uncle used to play there or he's a great hurler, he was the first person to this or do that. There are some really obscure ones and some really classic ones. But I'm trying to be fair and I'm trying to do every county, there's so many requests, for example for the Cork three-in-a-row in the '70s. You could do any amount of Cork or Dublin, the bigger counties, but that's not what I'm in for. I want to cover every county because there are some lovely jerseys out there."

"And then you go back in time to the Tipperary 1920 jersey. I'm not marketing it as anything but it is the year of Bloody Sunday and Michael Hogan. The Dublin 1921 jersey, which has a lovely tie-up neck, people have stories about that. They played Mayo in the 1921 All Ireland final and Sean Lavin in that game was the first guy to ever do a solo-run in Gaelic football. You come across all these stories and these wee bits of history connecting them, I find it fascinating."

Five top-selling jerseys

>> Dublin 1983
>> Kerry 1939
>> Meath 1988
>> Kilkenny 1933
>> Cork 1984