Victim of Prince Philip's latest goatee gaffe takes it on the chin and admits it's a weird beard
The designer whose beard earned the scorn of the Duke of Edinburgh has come forward – and admitted that Philip may well have been right.
The Mail on Sunday reported last week how the gaffe-prone Duke told the man, an unidentified guest at a Buckingham Palace garden party, that he was distinctly unimpressed by the tuft of hair on his chin, described by onlookers as a goatee.
His disparaging remarks prompted an outcry from beard groups that Philip was ‘beardist’.
Daddy cool? The target of Prince Philip's wrath Stephen Judge and 20-month-old son Jimmy
But when we eventually tracked down the target of Philip’s jibes, 38-year-old Stephen Judge, he didn’t turn a hair.
In fact he admitted he was often teased about the beard, which he described as a ‘soul patch’, and said of the Duke: ‘I could see a twinkle in his eye.’
Philip zeroed in on Stephen when they were introduced on July 14. On discovering that he was a designer, the Prince paused, then said: ‘You’re obviously not a hirsute designer.’
Seeing Stephen’s flustered expression, he added: ‘Your beard man – your poor, frustrated beard!’
Philip, who himself grew a ‘full set’ while serving in the Royal Navy in the Second World War, walked off after advising: ‘If you’re going to grow a beard, grow a beard.’
Teasing: Prince Philip told the designer to grow a 'proper beard'
But rather than take offence Stephen admitted: ‘A lot of people have said to me,
“What’s that on your chin?” Or they might try to be funny and say, “You’ve missed a bit.”
Stephen said his soul patch, first popularised by beatniks and jazz musicians such as Dizzy Gillespie in the Fifties, covers less than an inch of chin below the bottom lip.
He cultivated it at the age of 24, after graduating with an MA in design from the University of Central England, West Midlands.
‘I wanted to make a personal statement but I never wanted to grow a goatee,’ said Stephen.
‘I have stuck to my guns and kept my soul patch. I find it subtle – a very mild sort of beard and a mild statement to make as a designer.’
Stephen was at the Palace as a member of the Chartered Society of Designers, whose patron is Prince Philip.
Soul patch: Stephen Judge's facial hair has been growing for 14 years
He said: ‘We were all waiting and Prince Philip came to our group of around half-a-dozen people.
'He was making witty banter and when I told him I was a designer I could see a twinkle come in his eye and he was thinking of something witty to say.
‘Everybody laughed at his comments and I took it as it was meant, in good humour.’
However, Stephen has yet to convince his wife Kayte and 20-month-old son Jimmy about the virtues of a soul patch.
'Proper beard': The Prince with his Naval whiskers during the Second World War
Kayte, 30, said: ‘I like a full beard on a man and I think that the Prince has a point.’
Meanwhile, Stephen has stopped trimming his beard and aims to raise money for a sponsored shave on November 5 to raise funds for a children’s hospice – Keech Cottage in Luton, near his home in Bedford.
See www.justgiving.com/ifyouaregoingtogrowabeard.
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