Jas Thiara talks about her recent fundraising fashion show.

In August 2013 I began organising the Dare to Be Different fashion event in aid of Breast Cancer Care. It took place at the Royale Suite in Perry Barr on 4th July and raised £500 to support research into cancer prevention.

The stylish evening was hosted by the former Miss Birmingham, Rachael Barker, supporting emerging fashion designers Rochelle Melbourne , Riny Vaz and Birmingham’s menswear designer Akshay Vashisht. There were also performances by the very talented artists Bianca Gerald and Lushea Taylor.

The event promoted diversity, brought together a mix of talented and creative professionals from multicultural backgrounds around the country. They all helped support each other by working together to help develop skills and experience, but most importantly to inspire people and raise significant awareness and funds for Breast Cancer Care. They all contributed their various skills, expertise and invested a significant amount of time voluntarily as a team in aid of supporting a valuable cause, to make a positive difference and make this fashion show a fabulous success.

Organising the night helped me gain experience, provided young people and freelance professionals with opportunities of developing their skills, building their portfolios, exposure of their work and networking and promoted diversity. Most of all, it has raised such an awareness for such a good cause. We wanted to support women and men fighting cancer and raise awareness of the unfortunate ordeals they have to go through such as loss in hair, confidence and hope, as our motto and belief is that everyone deserves to feel beautiful and make a significant positive difference.

Thank you to all that came and contributed their services in aid of Breast Cancer Care and in support of my Dare to be Different event. My lovely MUAs, photographers, singers, dancers, DJs, Estee Lauder representatives – all your hard work is truly appreciated! A special thank you to all my models for all your hard work and dedication. You all looked very beautiful, did an amazing job and did me proud – well done! It was such a pleasure and great experience of working with such a great team of talented, creative professional. From the bottom of my heart, I thank you all truly!

Last but not least, a special thank you to my mother, my pillar of support, for believing in me and all her support even through the obstacles.

It has definitely been a long but very invaluable journey, where I have achieved so much, learnt many lessons and made so many great friends and connections along the way. There was plenty of negativity of people who didn’t believe I could do this. but it really is all about passion, determination and tenacity, along with willing to be brave enough to take risks to achieve your goal!

I have definitely achieved my ambition of pulling off such a positive, fun and rewarding fashion show event, which promoted diversity and raised funds for such a worthy cause. It has also been so fulfilling to help and support my team in terms of building experience, portfolios and connections. It feels so good to have achieved so much and to have made such a significant difference through being selfless, strong-minded, helping others and achieving a fabulous and successful night. It’s such a good feeling that I cannot put it into words.