Patrick James Grant was born on 1 May 1972 in Edinburgh, Scotland, to Susan and James Grant — his father a former pop band manager turned accountant, his mother a university employee. He has a younger sister, Victoria, who now works closely with him in business.

He studied Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Leeds, working for a decade in engineering and marketing before pursuing an MBA at Oxford’s Saïd Business School. In 2005, at age 33, he bought and revived the historic Savile Row tailoring house Norton & Sons, later relaunching E. Tautz & Sons as a ready-to-wear menswear label and founding the ethical manufacturing brand Community Clothing in 2016.

Since April 2013, Grant has been a judge on The Great British Sewing Bee, originally alongside WI tutor May Martin and now alongside Esme Young, currently airing on BBC One. In 2025, he was also installed as Chancellor of Edinburgh’s Queen Margaret University.

He keeps his personal life private; he was previously in an eight-year relationship with designer Katie Hillier that ended in 2016, and has reportedly been in a relationship with a London-based dentist since 2022, though he doesn’t discuss it publicly.