Edmund Blampied was born in the Parish of Saint Martin, Jersey in the Channel Islands. At age of 14 he went to work in the office of the town architect in Saint Helier, the capital of the island. His caricatures of politicians during a local election brought Blampied to the attention of a businessman who offered to sponsor him at art school in London. In January 1903, aged 16 years old and barely able to speak English, Blampied left Jersey to study at the Lambeth School of Art, where he was taught by Philip Connard R.A. and Thomas McKeggie.
In 1904 he was selected by the head of the Art School to work part-time on the staff of a national newspaper, The Daily Chronicle. His first published illustrations appeared in The Daily Chronicle on 13 January 1905. In September 1905 Blampied transferred from the Lambeth School of Art to the London County Council School of Photo-engraving and Lithography at Bolt Court. At the end of 1911 Blampied decided to set up his own studio, working as a commercial artist. With Scottish book publishers Thomas Nelson and Sons of Edinburgh he illustrated many children’s books and annuals during and immediately after the war.
He was elected an Associate of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers in 1920. He started to experiment with lithography in 1920, studying with Archibald Hartrick, a founder member of the Senefelder Club of lithographers. When the market for etchings collapsed during the great depression in the early 1930s, Blampied reinvented himself as a cartoonist and caricaturist.
In May 1938 Blampied was elected to the Royal Society of British Artists. Later that year he was asked to prepare some new illustrations for a lavish edition of Peter Pan. The Blampied Edition of Peter and Wendy was published in 1939 by Hodder & Stoughton in the UK and by Scribners in the US.
