Tag archive: beauty
Fashion a Better World
“…and Kirchstein’s final look, a fiery dress, was a showstopper.”
WHAT WHAT? HOLY COW!!! The reviewer was talking about the dress I was modeling!! Whoo hoo – I wore a showstopper!! Let me tell you, hitting the catwalk to sounds of cheers and cameras flashing is a pretty heady feeling and but to see the accolades in print is out of this world. Not bad for an old lady who JUST started this modeling thing! OK, not old, but middle aged. Just goes to prove that you’re never too old to try something new! I’m so excited to be part of a world that traditionally doesn’t recognize women if they aren’t 17 years old, skyscraper height and rail thin. I do believe that there’s room for REAL women in the modeling world after all and I’m living proof!!
Last weekend I was so very blessed to be asked to walk a runway show for the “Fashion a Better World” event at Top of the Hill Distillery in Chapel Hill, NC. It featured women entrepreneurs in North Carolina focused on sustainable fashion whose aim is to encourage artistic minds to bloom where they are planted, creating an ecosystem of creativity within North Carolina. Brooks Bell, entrepreneur and champion of women-led businesses, was the keynote speaker. They also featured a surprise celebrity guest which you can read about here. The event was sponsored by UNC as part of Global Entrepreneurship week, along with Triangle organizations, to give designers a platform to talk about the significance of their work and promote the growth of the fashion industry in NC.
I modeled for the fabulous Kim Kirchstein of Leopold Designs who is not only an amazing artist but she is one of the sweetest, most down to earth people I’ve had the pleasure of working with. I’m proud to call her my friend! Check out the UNREAL dress I got to wear. It’s actually 108″ x 45″ of hand-batik silk, with wet-into-wet dye and brushed-on wax strokes which create the soft textures in this design. Kim tied it around me in what she called “the pantsuit” tie. The feeling of silk enveloping my body was heavenly and then to wear it down the runway was just icing on the cake! Read this awesome review from Scope Magazine and the wonderful blog from Pretty Little Snipets to find out more more about all the brilliant designers and how incredible the night was. BRAVO to everyone and a special thanks to Symbology for hosting the event!
Colleen Ann Guest wearing a Leopold Design by Kim Kirchstein for Fashion a Better World
Colleen Ann Guest wearing a Leopold Design by Kim Kirchstein for Fashion a Better World
On the Runway – Colleen Ann Guest wearing a Leopold Design by Kim Kirchstein for Fashion a Better World. Photo by Josh Kongmany
On the Runway with Kim – Colleen Ann Guest wearing a Leopold Design by Kim Kirchstein for Fashion a Better World photo by Josh KornegayA Butterfly in Waiting
One year ago on September 8th, I made the decision to cut off all my hair and quit coloring it. It was one of the most liberating and revealing things I’ve ever done in my life. I noticed that while my super short, spiky hair felt foreign to me, it garnered a ton of attention. Most, if not all of it, was positive! Random people stopped me on the street, grocery store, wherever, to tell me they LOVED my hair. I enjoyed the compliments but was a bit unsure how to internalize and embrace them. Having long, beautiful hair had been my signature look for most of my life and I knew how to work it. I was exploring all new territory without the locks but was gaining confidence in the new look. If not for a financial crunch for us in January (salon services every 2-3 weeks is expensive!) I probably would have hung onto the new do long enough for it to become more “me.” So the regrowth began. It is now September, nine months since it was last shaved and one year since the the mighty scissors made the initial cut, and I can feel my hair catch the breeze again. Now that is a feeling that I am familiar with. While anxiously waiting for it to grow to ridiculous lengths again, I have recurring dreams that I wake up and it’s magically long – only to really wake up to a choppy, mop head. That’s discouraging. I press on though with hats, clips, gel, anything that allows me to be out in public without scaring children and causing people to recoil in disgust. OK, that’s an exaggeration, but suffice to say the random compliments have long since stopped. But I’m a big girl and this journey has taught me that my self-worth doesn’t lie in outward appearances. I am a caterpillar in the cocoon stage…in a few months I’ll emerge as a beautiful new butterfly!
DetailsRedress Raleigh Sightings in the Media!
The professional shots are starting to roll in and you can see some incredible shots of all the fashion and models! I have to say though, I’m especially partial to the designer I walked for: Margo Scott of Rocket Betty Designs! She has a Facebook page too!
If you have any Redress Raleigh sightings, then by all means post them in a comment here! I’ll post more links as I find them too.
- Thank you to Elizabeth Galecke Photography on Facebook for the featured image on this post! Go see the rest of her shots on her facebook page here: Elizabeth Galecke Photography Redress Raleigh Album or go visit her website at www.elizabethgalecke.com
- SimplyDPhoto.com website
- Facebook photo album by Qlint Chesney
- Michelle Smith’s blog
- Artery Blog in the Independent Weekly
- NC Museum of Natural Sciences Nature Research Center Grand Opening photos on Facebook
- WKNC 88.1 Blog
- Sarajane Case Photography
- Side Yard Studios slideshow
- New & Well blog
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Video footage of the event!
Details
What’s UP with your Hair??
Sitting in the barber chair, I felt my head get significantly lighter as the barber snipped away my long tresses. It was a liberating feeling! It was like something intangible was lifted away along with the weight of the hair. I couldn’t help feel a tiny little bit of remorse though for what I had just done when I gazed down at the pile of freshly shorn locks that used to be attached to my head. Yet at the same time I felt giddy with a sense of daring bravery – like I had just broken out of prison. I had spent the majority of my life adorned by, enveloped by, and defined by long curtains of hair. I loved my long hair. I still do. And it will be back. But for now, it’s fun to be sporting a sassy crop of spikes haloing my face.
So the burning question on everyone’s lips these days is, “Why in the world did you do it?” (I bet some people think I’m having a midlife crisis.) As to the short hair, there seems to be two camps of opinion out there. Some people can’t fathom that I got rid of such pretty long hair and think I’ve made a huge mistake. Other people think it’s the coolest thing I’ve ever done. I’ve gotten lots of compliments and the majority of them center around the phrase, “you look so much younger.” THAT, I find extremely humorous. After reading the rest of this, you will too.
Alright, so is it a midlife crisis? In a way, yes. But not in the traditional sense. I am 45 years old and that most certainly qualifies me as middle-aged. I can see and feel the signs of an aging body, face, and hair every time I look in the mirror or tackle a set of stairs. My children are grown up; my daughter is married and my son has graduated from college. I am getting older and it’s a reality. When I look back at pictures of my former, youthful self, I see and recall a crowning glory of long, vibrant, silky, full-bodied hair – dark brown with red and gold highlights. It was a thing of beauty which never failed to garner attention.
But in my mid 30s I discovered (oh the horror) a few nasty, wiry, silver hairs poking up through my luscious strands like a gleaming pitch fork tines. Um…WHAT? This couldn’t be happening to ME! So I plucked them . . . and they re-grew . . . and apparently multiplied. (Word to the wise – plucking gray hairs is like dowsing water on your Mogwai – see, I told you I was old – you are too if you get that reference) So one day, I did the unthinkable – broke down and bought a couple of boxes of hair color. “This is it,” I thought, “say goodbye to the beautiful hair forever.” I actually cried. The thought of having to color ALL of my hair when all I wanted to do was cover up a few gray strands killed me. I still had TONS of beautiful locks! But I took a deep breath, wiped away the tears, and did it. And for the last 10 years I’ve been doing it. At first I could get away with going 3-5 months without re-coloring it. Over the past decade that time has diminished to its current range of about 3 weeks between colorings.
Over the last several weeks I’ve had a revelation. Life is short – and no, that’s not the revelation – I’ve known that for a while. What I mean is, our lives can be defined in 5 (yes FIVE) 20 year phases:
- youth/school aged = birth-20
- young adulthood = 20-40
- middle-aged = 40-60
- senior = 60-80
- elderly = 80-100
That’s it. Only 5. I’ve lived and enjoyed the heck out of the first two phases but suddenly I find myself in the third phase. Five years into the third phase at that. I only have 2 more phases after this one (if I’m lucky)!!
Revelation – I WANT TO LIVE while I’m alive (Thank you Bon Jovi for those words of wisdom)! I embraced the first two phases with gusto and made the most of them and I want to do the same with this one, and the one after and the one after that. I don’t want to wake up when I’m 60 and wonder why the heck I wasted what could have been the most vibrant phase of my life in denial and pretending I was still living in the previous phase; desperately clinging to it like I was hanging from a rope over the edge of the Grand Canyon.
God, in his infinite wisdom gave us a graceful transition to the last two phases – not an abrupt screeching halt. We do that to ourselves. Why on earth don’t we just allow ourselves to age gracefully and embrace every moment of who we are? I for one do NOT want to wake up one day and suddenly be a wrinkly, gray-haired, little old lady and have arrived there as if a train smashed into a concrete wall. I want to make a gradual change and welcome the new beauty in my body, face, and hair, at every age. We only get one chance to live our lives. I don’t want to live mine as a lie. I’ve blown almost 10 years of it already in denial. I’m not going to waste once second more!
So back to the burning question, “what’s up with the hair?” Well, I’ve had it. I’m done! No more hair color for me!! I want my crowning glory back in whatever color and texture it happens to be. After several weeks of investigating my options, it appeared to me that the fastest way to accomplish my goal would be to cut off all my hair and let it re-grow. I’m far too impatient and frugal to spend the next several years trying to highlight, lowlight, tweak, or whatever-it-is-they-do to my hair to mask the line of color growth. So off it came.
THAT was phase 1. Phase 2 is the color change you’ve all been guessing at, but now you know it’s not what you thought it would be. Growing and snipping away the old color will take several months to accomplish, but my hair grows fast so it won’t be a long wait. I can already see real hair! Phase 3 is the re-growth to restore those long tresses to a new-found beauty. That will surely be the longest phase but one I’m going to have a lot of fun with. There will be lots of great hairstyles to play with along the way.
Hopefully my journey of hair transformation will inspire other people (especially women) to grab hold of life and live it to the fullest. My advice: embrace who you are and where you are – right now! Don’t live in the past and don’t live for the future. You’re missing out on LIFE if you do either.
Colleen Ann Guest
September 14, 2011
Phase 1 complete . . . Phase 2 underway . . .
