Product

BRAND STORY: Beige Crü

Beige Crü. You’ve seen the clothing, you’ve seen the brand doing things online, you’ve seen some key UK heads shouting it out on Insta, but you perhaps haven’t thought about who runs it, how they make it work, or what the brand is all about.

We wanted to do those things, so we had a chat with Jake Ellis all about Beige Crü. We also collaborated on releasing their new video Lightwork v.1, filmed by Luke Duffy around Bristol with the likes of Harry Mills Wakley and Emerson Morgan. Too classy. Read on, watch on…

Riding photos by Clint Vancliff
Product photos by Crü

Q&A with Jake Ellis

– Hey Jake. Give us a quick description of Beige Crü, what’s it all about?

Crü is all about having a collective platform for us to showcase creativity both individually and as a group. Whether it’s riding, photography, videos or the clothes we put it, it’s all been part of a natural progression where the business has grown organically and leaned into each of these mediums.

– How much work goes into having a brand like this and releasing a whole new clothing collection?

To be honest (and as cliche as it sounds) it never feels like work, but I suppose it is in a way… Talking about the clothing specifically, we really just try to do our best to make clothes that we would personally want to wear and then open that up for other people to rep the brand and be a part of it. When releasing collections, we pay attention to detail and try to think responsibly about how we conduct ourselves. For example, we sourced the basic tees (that we have run in every collection) specifically to be a bit more environmentally friendly and have been exploring different ways to produce better ethical and sustainable products since the very start.

Every collection has come together naturally and the fact people are repping it just makes us really grateful and motivated to keep making more. Of course there’s a lot of logistics and organisation involved but as a group we collaborate really well and just get it done.

“Every collection has come together naturally and the fact people are repping it just makes us really grateful and motivated to keep making more”

– What was the vision for the new collection?

The vision has always been to remain true to how it started as a crew and to kit our friends out in good clothes. I think the people supporting Crü recognise that and as a result they’re a good bunch of people repping and wanting to see it grow.

The visual side of a collection or content is really important for us also, most of it is relatively minimalist to keep it clean. It’s been a case of pulling creative direction and input from a few different sources and it’s great to see it all come together so well with the latest drop.

– Do you see it as a BMX brand or more of a streetwear brand?

We all met through BMX, so there’s no doubt that it’s influenced the brand and the content we put out, but it’s by no means limited only to the BMX community even if that’s where it originally stemmed from. The brand represents a lot more about the crew than just BMX, and the idea of a collaborative platform means that all of the content or products we put out are equally important to us.

– You’ve got a small team of UK riders who rep the brand. Who’s in the crew?

The group has expanded as we’ve moved around over the years. So we’ve got all the original boys we grew up riding with, Billy Cooper, Tom Milham, Bakos and then the Canterbury boys like OJ, Ollie Sheilds, James Cunningham and Crizzo. As we’ve travelled, we’ve inadvertently grown by meeting people who’ve just naturally joined us – with myself spending time in Cali, and Luke in Amsterdam and Bristol, the group has continued to grow as we’ve linked up people like, Emerson Morgan and Harry Mills-Wakley as well as Giano Vacca and Joeri Veul all of whom are of very similar mindset to us.

– Do you think the brand has a geographical identity, like, is it all about Essex, or do you see it more of a London brand, or something else?

It’s definitely a UK brand. We’ve got influences from cultures all across the country and we’ve all got really different backgrounds which makes for a pretty interesting melting pot of inspiration and ideas.

– What’s coming up next, any BMX projects / promo in the works?

We have a longer mixtape that is about 75% finished, filmed pretty much entirely during lockdown and all in Bristol. All of our videos are about getting out with a big group and just letting clips naturally happen, you know. With the various challenges of lockdown, we’ve had to do more lowkey sessions, filmed over quite a long time – however that has had its benefits too. We’re looking forward to getting it finished as this one has been really enjoyable to film.

… And of course this light session that dropped with this piece for RideUK!