Ellington

The clothes change from year to year, but the Everybody Every Body Fashion Show still carries the same message.

In recognition of National Eating Disorder Awareness Week, the Student Health Consortium (SHC), ASUW Arts and Entertainment (A&E) and the Women’s Action Commission (WAC) are putting on ASUW’s fourth annual Everybody Every Body Fashion Show tonight in Kane Hall.

Josephine Garcia, director of SHC, said she hopes audience members leave the show feeling that they don’t have to fit in with the people they see on TV or in films.

“I hope that people start to love themselves and love their bodies the way they are,” Garcia said. “And for our models, I hope that they get a sense of heightened self-confidence. It takes a lot of guts to walk out in front of 700 people, so I hope it helps them feel good about themselves and what they’re doing.”

The show has grown in recent years, and this year, Robert Higa, administrative assistant of A&E, said that there was more and a wider variety of clothing donated than for previous shows. Of the 15 retailers participating this year, nine are new to the event.

This year’s show will feature clothing designed by Seattle Art Institute students Celene Tolentino and Megan Cherewatenko, as well as Project Runway contestant Richard Blayne Walsh. It will also feature local clothing from stores on the Ave, downtown Seattle and University Village.

Securing big name boutiques such as Betsey Johnson and Mario’s was another element of the show’s increasing popularity, and Higa said that putting them on the planning team’s reach list and having them featured broadened the scope of the clothing for the event. Members of the planning team went into the stores themselves to personally speak with store managers to explain the message of the fashion show, which Higa said helped get them on board.

Stephanie Smith, the Betsey Johnson store manager, said that even though loaning out clothes was unusual for the boutique, she agreed to donate to the fashion show because of its message.

“Usually our company won’t loan clothes out for things of this nature, but I thought that it would be a really good thing to do because a lot of women struggle with body image,” Smith said. “Anything that promotes healthy body image, I want to be a part of, and I think that it’s really important to get behind things like that because there are so few measures out there.”

Smith said that Betsey Johnson donated about 20 items of clothing to the fashion show.

Tanya Friberg, store manager of The Finerie, said that she is glad that eating disorders are discussed more often than they used to be and that this fashion show addresses the issue.

“Hopefully [the fashion show] can help students be aware of their own behavior and maybe seek help on their own before it becomes a more serious disease,” Friberg said. “The Finerie approach for this particular fashion show was to allow the students to try on whatever they liked in the store and select the outfit that they felt the most fabulous in.”

About 140 models will participate in the show, and Garcia said that this year the show is more of a celebration to promote the happier side of body acceptance.

“We’re trying to make the show more fun [to help] attract more people,” Garcia said. “The fashion show is a fun way of getting people involved and getting people to care about the issue [of eating disorders].”

While the fashion show is taking on a more celebratory approach to body image, the SHC will also be hosting a panel discussion entitled “Be(You)tiful” to seriously discuss eating disorders. The discussion will be held in Savery Hall on Feb. 28. It will feature a Q-and-A session with a panel of eating-disorder experts, including dieticians, physicians, counselors, therapists and psychologists.

“The Be(You)tiful panel will mostly be addressing questions like, ‘What can I do if I feel my friend has an eating disorder? What are the signs? And how can I help?’” Garcia said. “We’ll screen a couple of eye-opening documentaries, and we’ll have a panel of knowledgeable people who have a lot of experience dealing with these issues.”

Another change to this year’s fashion show is the venue. With the HUB renovation, the fashion show will take place in Kane Hall. Also, along with modeling, some students will read poems and other written works about body image.

Sam Weinstein, ASUW director of programming, who helped plan the fashion show, hopes that people who attend the fashion show learn from the example of the participants.

“I hope that people who come and see the fashion show are able to recognize that we have amazing people on this campus who are confident in the skin that they’re in and the bodies they have,” she said.

Reach reporter Sarah Schweppe at news@dailyuw.com.