Best known for his work with luxury names like Learjet and Bentley, branding expert Steve Edge has created a new look for M&E contractor Alpha. Will Jones meets up for a makeover.
“When someone walks into your office dressed like Oscar Wilde you take notice”, says Gerald Hamilton ex-managing director of Fortnum & Mason. “They’re either completely mad or brilliant, and in that garb they haven’t got long to convince you it’s the latter.”
Steve Edge did convince him. “He’s showbiz, deliciously eccentric”, laughs Hamilton. “But we also saw in him an intuitive understanding of the image that Her Majesty’s grocer wanted to project.”
Steve Edge Design, is the force that styles the brands who equip the international jetset. As well as Fortnum & Mason, clients include Rules Restaurant, Caprice Events, Cartier and Richemont. Gunsmith to the elite, James Purdey & Son, employed Edge to revamp its world-wide image and it now has a flourishing US clientele. The same goes for St James-based milliners Lock & Co. Where once the brand was viewed as rather staid, it is now attracting a younger client, and in the three months since Edge redesigned their millinery catalogue, sales are reported to have risen by over 70%.
All this from a little skinny dyslexic kid from East End. Edge, born to struggling artist parents in 1958, had a loving, if somewhat unusual, family life. His father, a sculptor, would scrape a living working at Smithfield meat market to support his wife, three kids and pet chimpanzee.
Becoming interested in advertising and brands even as a child, Edge has been whetting appetites since the age of 12. His first published work was designs for pets’ homes in Practical Woodwork magazine and winning a national young artist’s award at 15 prompted a top London graphic design studio to offer Edge a position as a junior designer.
Since then a string of adventures have shaped the Steve Edge that you see today. He’s trained as a jockey, been a model-maker on Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark, even managing the odd cameo role. He’s caught record-breaking fish in India, been ‘knighted’ by a Maharajah, and been sworn in as an honorary Eagle Dancer in a Native American Indian tribe. However, the desire to shape peoples’ imagination, to create a story around something real, is Edge’s first love – other than his family and fly fishing, that is.
In 1982 Edge set up the company that he runs today. “It’s creating the story that I really enjoy, ma ing the customer feel that they are part of something special, making them want to belong,” says Edge. “And my client list reveals my love of established names – Marks & Spencer, Christian Dior, Old England (Paris) and Lalique.
“Old firms have such a wonderful history. They’ve refined their product and brand over the years until it is the best that it can be. Whether it’s food, pens, hats or diamonds, you know that when someone buys into these brands they’re not going to be disappointed. The buyer is taken in by the myth, the marketing, but in the end they’re still blown away by a fabulous product. That’s the type of company I work with.”
Leave a Reply