Rockett St George - The Story So Far

It’s a story that has its roots in car boot sales, eBay and a passion (some might say obsession...) for decorating. When Jane Rockett and Lucy St George bonded over haggling at a crowded flea market in the early 2000s, little did they know it was the beginning of a beautiful friendship and interior design journey that would lead to where they are today. The business Jane and Lucy started at their kitchen tables 17 years ago – Rockett St George - has flourished into a venture that now supports a 50-strong workforce and boasts nine busy warehouses. Here’s the story so far...

‘We call this the car boot era,’ says Lucy. ‘Weekends weren’t weekends without 5am alarm calls to make sure we were the early birds that found all the best 'worms’. Then we’d sell them on eBay, but soon discovered we couldn’t keep up with demand. And so a little idea was born...’

‘After two years of lovingly cleaning up our finds and sending them out from our kitchen tables, it became obvious we needed bigger premises,’ says Jane. ‘We outgrew our first base almost straight away, and so the next part of our story began. We moved to our current location, which is a stone’s throw from the South Downs in West Sussex (amazing for inspirational walks, by the way). We now have nine busy warehouses that are a hive of activity – I like to visualise a constant stream of Rockett St George items being delivered up and down the country!’ 

‘Three years later and it’s time to start designing collections in-house,’ says Lucy. ‘It’s our mission to inspire creativity and personal expression through interior design, and there’s no better way than by leading by example! Cue a trip to India to meet with local artisans, and curate the ideas and materials that still serve us now. We still work with the suppliers who handcraft some of our best-selling designs today, in fact, including the Palm Tree Floor Lamp.’ 

‘This is an incredible period in our timeline, when we were starting to be recognised for our individuality and unique take on interiors,’ says Jane. ‘We collaborated on projects with iconic British designer Matthew Williamson, worked on the interior design of legendary Ibizan hotel Pikes, launched a pop-up shop in Harvey Nichols in Knightsbridge, and had a four-year residency at Liberty London. It was a crazy three years, and I remember thinking it proved the saying, ‘there’s no such thing as an overnight success’ perfectly. We'd been consolidating our brand values for the best part of a decade at this point, and it was amazing to see all that hard work beginning to pay off.’

‘We now stock 3500+ products, dispatch 8000 orders monthly and have a customer base just shy of 150,000 loyal fans,’ says Lucy. ‘It’s so far from when we were dusting down car boot finds that we regularly have to pinch ourselves. We’ve been featured in the Sunday supplements, written two books - Extraordinary Interiors, and Extraordinary Interiors in Colour – and have just launched three collections with high street retailer NEXT. It's a crazy story, and we count ourselves very lucky to work in such a vibrant industry. We're super-grateful to have such a hard-working and committed team, too – we couldn’t do any of this without them. Here’s to the next 17 years!’