Jed: How do Unique look for new faces? What are the ways for the agency to discover them: How did you discovered these amazing new models- Tomas of course, Eddie and Mael.
Jesper: First of all - we are constantly keeping an eye out for new talent. So if I'm doing grocery-shopping, riding my bike through Copenhagen or at a party - I'm always scanning the street or room. Some of our most successful models, Freja and Eddie amongst others, were scouted that way. Unique has - on the women's side - a long history of doing Super Model of The World with FORD Models. But Jacqueline the CEO of Unique and I, wanted to do a more organized scanning for the boys too. So we decided to do a modelsearch for both boys and girls. We do 'Open Castings' all over Denmark. It turned out to be a great success. More boys than girls showed up. Last time we did it - I found Thomas and Mael.
Jed: Tell us more about Jesper, the man behind Unique's men's division, how did you started in the agency and tell us some of your favorite discoveries.
Jesper: Well, I'm 28 yrs old and I started at Unique about three years ago. Before that I've been studying Art History at the University of Copenhagen for 3,5 years. But I could never see me working in that field, so I started doing styling instead. Later I moved to New York and worked as a stylist for Patricia Field for a while.
Right after moving back to Copenhagen I was approached by a guy from Unique who is also a very close friend of mine. He asked me if I would come for an interview and I said yes. I started as an assistant booker, but now I'm taking care of the division by myself. Of course it's always fun to discover guys like Eddie, Mael and Thomas who instantly does great internationally. But I take great pride in finding strong commercial guys for the danish market too.
Jed: How is Copenhagen as a place to discover talents? Where do you usually go for looking for new faces?
Jesper: People always think that Denmark is floaded in beautiful young blonde men – but that is actually not true. I must say - that when I travel I realize that people here in Denmark are prettier than most other places - but pretty isn't enough to make it in this industry. We have a lot of guys emailing me pictures everyday - and we are always open for walk-ins. But most of our guys are found in the streets or at our ModelSearches.
[ Click on any image to view | Eddie Klint's various ads and editorials ]
Jed: What qualities do you look for a male model?
Jesper: It's really hard to say. I have three sub-divisions in the Men's Division. EDGE is for all the more Editorial boys. UNIQUE is for the more commercial and DIRECT is all the guys I represent for direct bookings. And of course I have to scout for all three divisions. But of course I'm thrilled when I find someone and he turnes out to be a really cool guy and easy to work with too!
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Jed: Future plans for the agency- and for your career as an agent/talent manager.
Jesper: Well I think Unique Men has gone through a great change in the last couple of years and I'm proud of it. So basically I want to continue the direction we are on now. We are constantly trying to renew ourselves and do things differently. And so far it's been paying of!
