Richard's beard

I grew a beard, because I didn't feel like myself. When I shaved it off I expected to feel like myself again. I didn't, but it was the start.

Richard Garside with a beard Richard Garside without a beard

My friend Pete committed the whole thing to film. I wanted to capture what I felt was a deep spiritual moment. Pete added the music, which reveals wonderfully that shaving off a beard, is in fact, quite silly.

I published the video in the same month that You-Tube released it's first beta. However, I didn't know that at the time, so I published it on my own site.

My video was featured on Boing Boing and about 50,000 people flooded to my site in response. My very understanding hosting company decided not to charge me for the extra bandwidth I used. This is lucky as it would have cost me over £1,000 at their stated charges.

The shear ridiculousness of it all really made me smile. It also inspired me to get stuck into playing about with my own ideas outside of the normal 9 to 5. The beard has led to a number of very fantastic things.