Happy New Year!
So, our blog has been dormant and that's not a good thing. But when we look back, we realise this started happening during the lockdowns. Lots has happened since then, and, despite the continued challenges faced by retail, Flair has been busy over the last couple of years and we think 2023 is the time to get back to the blog!
We'd like to start by telling you about our next event on Sunday 12 February that we are hosting with Northern Lashes at the Castlefield Rooms in Manchester. It is an anti-bullying fashion and beauty event to promote confidence, say 'NO' to bullying and raise money for BeeU, the touring drama-based workshop set up by Sofia Management. The campaign was created to help children and adults deal with bullying through drama workshops. The workshops include, talks, games and role play all about victims and harmers. The Campaign has been featured by Granada Reports.
I met Liana, founder of Northern Lashes at a book launch in 2021. Northern Lashes is an eco friendly company providing handmade vegan lash products, with revolutionary eco-friendly packaging. Liana is also passionate about anti-bullying. In 2021, I met another young lady with a desire to stamp out bullying. I was lucky enough to showcase Flair at Cheshire Fashion Week and Saoirse was one of my models. Her confidence and beauty struck me immediately at the opening night at the Jaguar Showroom in Chester so it was incredible to have her walk for Flair the next night at Chester Cathedral.
I knew then that I needed to bring Liana and Saoirse together for an event collaboration and that was the inspiration for February's event. Tickets are available from Eventbrite: https://bit.ly/3VLg2xI
And if you want to know why it's so important to support this event, please read Saoirse's story...
Saoirse’s Story
Hi my name is Saoirse and throughout school I was bullied about my appearance. In school boys would laugh at me, insult me and ask me to go out with them as a joke on a daily basis which has affected me going into relationships as whenever a boy gave me attention I would ask myself why and still think it was some sort of joke. I would always think that ‘this boy wouldn’t have given any attention to me when I was in school why now?’ People in school used to quack at me and say I looked like a duck so I would end up crying in the toilets just wanting to get rid of my big top lip. I would cry when I went to school and when I left, I would always beg my dad every morning not to take me.
Even people who I thought were my friends would make fun of me they would pick at my appearance whether that be my hair, eyebrows, teeth, nose, everything and laugh at whatever I did. My friends would sometimes even call me the ‘bigger’ one of the group when they would compare our sizes and people would make fun of how much I ate. It got to a point where I was afraid of eating in front of my own ‘friends’ so would end up hardly eating anything and if I did, I would eat in the toilets or binge eat when I got home from school, this resulted in me losing a lot of weight in high school.
As I got older in school I was invited to more parties and thought I was becoming more ‘popular’ and that things would get better but at these parties my ‘friends’ would just find any excuse to make fun of me and humiliate me whether that be throwing drink over me, throwing dirt at me, pushing me or in the case of one party where there was a pool pushing my head under the water. All I ever wanted was my friends to accept me and I think that’s why I just put up with how they were with me. This has resulted in me being anxious when meeting new people and making new friends as I feel like I am never good enough and people won’t like me.
I used to use singing to take me away from feeling not good enough, one time I decided to film myself singing and put it online. The next day after I had put the video up, I was on the school bus and I had people singing what I had sung and making fun of me for it and then some more people would do the same when I got to school so I took the videos down straight away. Whenever I upload videos of me singing now, I still get apprehensive about what people will think. Being bullied really affected my self-confidence massively.
However, my anxieties are much better now due to having friends now that love me for who I am and get me and would never make fun of me, having an amazing family I can always rely on, a relationship with someone who makes me feel like the most amazing girl in the world and one of the things that has helped me gain my confidence back the most is modelling. I have always had a massive love of fashion and would always look at models in magazines and think how beautiful they were, and I wish I looked like them, never ever did I think I would be one of those models in a magazine.
I have gone on to model in many publications one of which I was on the front cover, and I’ve even been on some book covers modelling.
I have also modelled at catwalk shows for London fashion week and Cheshire Fashion Week where I met the amazing Anna Barker as I was modelling for her brand Flair Boutique. I had such an amazing conversation with Anna about my bullying experience and how I have always wanted to be part of a charity fashion event for anti-bullying as it was really important to me. Anna thought this was a great idea and was able to organise this amazing event with Lianna from northern lashes who I also met, and she had her own personal experiences with bullying and such an inspiring story.
This event will be raising money for the anti-bullying campaign BeeU who deliver drama-based workshops helping people learn more about bullying. I wish that my school would’ve had workshops like those done by BeeU as it is so important for children and young people in schools to be aware of what bullying is and how negatively it can impact upon a person.
I wish I could go back to my old self and tell her that everything is going to be okay and to not listen to other people’s opinions. I still have my down days of not feeling good enough, but I do feel as though I have come out stronger from the bullying and it has motivated me even more to prove the bullies wrong and to help other people. I think everyone should remember that being kind is the most beautiful thing anyone can do.
❤️
