K. Bobby Edgar (third left) with members of his family who are, from left, Patsy Doreth Wright, mother of his two last boys, Reynaldo Dean Edgar, son; sister Faye White and sons Kenton Dave Edgar and Tyrone Martin Edgar.
Avia Collinder, Outlook Writer
K. Bobby Edgar has never been a slow starter. Nor has he ever suffered from the delusion that he should wait around to be given the things which he wanted most out of life.
At age 12, he rented space for his first sewing and tailoring establishment by threatening the proprietor in Old Harbour town with a report to his parents - those upstanding citizens of Bannister in Old Harbour, Inez and Sydney Edgar - if he refused him.
With his arms thus twisted, the owner caved in and, while three hired workers laboured over sewing machines, young Edgar, their employer, was in school - Old Harbour Secondary.
This was the school he had chosen over Calabar, for which he had passed the Common Entrance Examination, because Old Harbour Secondary had home economic programmes.
In the evenings, while his six other siblings had 'normal' childhood, the adolescent would take the measurement of clients and cut fabric to fill orders and leave these to be sewn by his workers the next day.
Designing for beauty queens and brides
A few years later, the boy who had made his first design for a bridal party at age 12 (and for which many in Old Harbour came to the wedding ceremony just to see) was sewing and designing gowns for beauty queens and brides.
K. Bobby Edgar was born precocious and has been making waves ever since.
Today, he is an Emmy award-winning stylist with with several film and movie credits to his name. K. Bobby's special skills include special effects hair creation - modern, avant-garde and period styles, special effects make-up artist, fashion designing - including sewing, pattern making, illustration, dancing and choreography, interior and exterior and stage instructions, and a talent coach and wedding planner.
From October of 1980, Kenneth 'K. Bobby' Edgar successfully managed several imaging projects for the American film and television industry. There he was an employed journeyman (head of film and television hair/make-up and image creation) for over 20 years until he opened his own consultancy in the same field in 1997.
In 1994, Edgar won an Emmy for his work in the Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All - CBS.
His other film credits include Beverly Hills Ninja - Independence; That Thing You Do - 20th Century Fox; Home Boys In Outer Space - Walt Disney; Danielle Steele's Full Circle - NBC; Riot - Trilogy - Showtime; Wayans Brothers - WB Network; Blessed Assurance - CBS; The Road To Galveston - USA; Days of Our Lives - NBC and Sweet Justice - NBC.
He recently returned to Jamaica to launch Kefa Lifestyle Consultants - a fashion house featuring designs of natural and luxurious fabrics.
The last year has been filled with nail-biting tension as K. Bobby is determined to resurrect his adolescent passion for design, having set it aside for hairstyling.
At Old Harbour Secondary, he had passed SSS subjects, including clothing and textiles. He had also enrolled himself in dance and hair classes, signing up for Eddie Thomas' dance class, fashion designing classes as the only male student with Madge Francis (Madam François) and, at the same time, also enrolled at Leon's School of Beauty Culture in Kingston.
"I wanted to be good at all trades and master of them all. I also wanted to ensure that when one thing bored me I would have something else to fall back on," Edgar reflects.
He would also pick young ladies for beauty pageants, groom and dress them and watch them walk away, time and time again, with the crown. "In one competition, I had groomed both the winner and the girl who won second place."
His mother supported him in all of this, but his father said 'no'.
"He thought that doing hair was for 'pansies'," his son reports. But, K. Bobby was not to be deterred and later, when he migrated to Cayman and from there to Florida, it was his talent with hair which led him to Hollywood.
Edgar, who graduated from Old Harbour Secondary in 1976, enrolled at Mico Teachers' College and was sent to Ginger Ridge Primary to do service training. He never completed the programme, however, deciding to go to Florida to work at the Hair and Such beauty salon. Edgar was asked to work with models, one of whom happened to be observed by Cicely Tyson on a cross-country flight.
"I want my hair to look like that," Tyson cried. The rest was history.
Marriage disaster
Tyson asked Edgar to do her hair consistently, a request which led to engagements for film and TV. On one occasion, she walked off a film for three hours until lawyers caved into her demands to have Edgar regularised as a working union member.
Edgar admits that he flourished with Cicely Tyson as his champion, and that disaster only struck when the woman he married - a member of the modelling industry - divorced him and stripped him of all he owned.
It was his bitterness over this experience and his desire to avoid seeing her at every turn (they remained members of the same social and business circles) which drove him back home.
Back in Jamaica, Edgar worked briefly in the tourist industry, then settled on fashion design and image styling, creating his own company, which made its debut last year at Caribbean Fashionweek.
For him, Caribbean Fashionweek 2007 was nerve-wracking, but it was also full of excitement and anticipation. K. Bobby explains, "Starting a business without collateral is almost impossible. You are taking from Peter to pay Paul and dipping into your children's nest egg. But I took the risk because I knew it would pay off."
Referring to his experience in Hollywood's film and television industry in the last 20 years, he states, "They say fashion is risky, but it is, in fact, a billion-dollar industry."
Current challenges for his new project include the high rent for office and production space. He is not worried about finding a market for his designs which are made of natural fabrics. Instead, he is waiting on seed capital to produce at the level which companies are demanding.
The feedback from Fashionweek, he says, was excellent, and the biggest problem is "convincing those in government that we can do quality work". The support for Government would mean money for a building and machinery.
Positve developments
Edgar notes that the fashion cluster initiated by the European Union (EU) is a positive development for fashion producers like himself, although the EU expects beneficiaries to shop for materials and supplies in Europe. The problem is - America is where the raw materials markets are.
K. Bobby Edgar designs in crocus, calico, tapestry, hemp and some silks. "I am going green," he declares, noting that if he gets the seed capital of US$3 million which he needs the K. Bobby Edgar label will be an internationally known one.
Edgar is pleased that his youngest son, Kenton, is following in his footsteps. He is proud of his entire brood of six, which includes Dean Marico, an astronaut; Tamica, a medical student; Troy, who is majoring in musical production; Tyrone, his twin, who is a biochemistry student, and Reynaldo Dean, who is in pre-med.
Like many of his children, K. Bobby Edgar is in the embryonic stage of a new career phase.
But he is confident that he will find the support he needs to make a 12-year-old boy's dream come true.
