A Suffolk woman is hoping to boost body positivity with a fashion show in Ipswich next month.
Jess Shire, 22 from Woodbridge will hosting the event at St Peter’s by the Waterfront to promote confidence and self love.
The show is part of a project Miss Shire is running called ‘Positively Me!’ which was inspired by her own attempts to overcome confidence issues.
Positively Me! shares positive social media stories about body conference and tackles issues such as the use of photoshop in modelling and the impact this can have on young people.
Miss Shire spent much of her youth wearing a feeding tube leaving her a target for bullies at both primary and secondary school.
“I was in and out of hospital an awful lot,” said Miss Shire.
Miss Shire is now a Brownie leader for the 3rd Woodbridge Brownies and it was in her role at Girlguiding UK that she was able to visit to a body confidence conference held by soap brand Dove.
“That was really good fun,” said Miss Shire, “It sparked something for me to get involved with body confidence.”
Inspired by the conference and her own experiences Miss Shire set about looking at how she could change attitudes towards confidence and beauty more generally.
“I wanted to change what it meant to be a typical model but I didn’t know how to do it,” said Miss Shire.
The answer came in the form of Girlguiding Anglia’s Action for Change programme which is a social action programme for young women over the age of 14.
Those involved spend nine months trying to make real change in their communities.
Miss Shire’s project will culminate in her fashion show which will feature models of all sizes, shapes, ages, abilities and backgrounds.
She hopes that the show will help highlight the lack of representation in the fashion industry.
“I actively believe that part of the issue, is that normal, real people still don’t have enough representation in the fashion industry,” said Miss Shire.
“Although its starting to improve, we are not doing enough to address this issue.
“Fashion is made for everybody.”
The fashion show will see the models wearing clothes that they wouldn’t normally wear in an attempt to push their own boundaries.
“I really hope that this event can show that we all matter, that we all deserve a chance to be represented and that we all have a place in mainstream advertising and it shouldn’t be for a limited few,” said Miss Shire.
The show will take place on April 24 at St Peter’s by the Waterfront between 7pm and 9.30pm. It is free to attend.
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