Booked: Rejoice Fashion Show

(All photos by: Nothing But Jason)

Strutting comfortably in high-heeled shoes is an obstacle in itself. The task becomes even more daunting when wearing Indian saris or African-inspired gowns while walking down a 50-foot runway in front of 150 pairs of eyes. Booked attended the Rejoice cultural fashion show last night at UBC-Okanagan. Having just returned back from New York Fashion Week yesterday, it was a cool feeling seeing what I experienced out of the country back at school in Kelowna. Upon entering the venue, there was an overwhelming sense of pride and camaraderie both backstage and during the show. This made for an awesome event along with the exquisite traditional clothing students wore in addition to Dare To Wear Love dresses from Toronto Fashion Week.

Model Carmen Dolinsky was wearing clothes representing Germany even though she is of Swedish decent. Having described her own casual style as “hippy-esque”, it was interesting recognizing how a student’s style can be multifaceted in the way that their personality, individual way of dressing and cultural heritage came together to make a unique look. Carmen believes this event was a good demonstration of how multicultural the UBC-O campus is becoming. Hosts Emmy Chahal and Mariam Hazhir explained how the event was truly about people from different cultures coming together to not only celebrate their own heritage, but to embrace their fellow students’ cultures as well. For example model Dialla Kawar, a student of Arabic decent, wore Indian clothing while model Kofi Mireku, a student who was raised in New Castle wore clothing from his motherland Ghana. It was the common goal of recognizing campus diversity and wanting to support the Stephen Lewis Foundations to help people affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa that brought everyone together.

-Liam

I (Yaw) have always wondered what it would be like to live Liam's life. Now for those who don't know Liam, he is the epitome of what it means to be Booked. He is our one and only in-house model. Now for the rest of the Booked team, we occasionally look to Liam for pointers on how to pose or take a solid picture in our concept shoots. Yesterday, I asked Liam to show me how to walk as I got to be part of a multicultural charity fashion show that showcased individuality, diversity and passionate students at UBC-Okanagan. The show showcased regions and cultures such as the First Nations of Westbank, Germany, South America, India and my motherland Ghana. Every garment was exquisite and beautifully made. I felt like every piece of clothing that came down the runway yesterday had a history, familial story, tradition behind it, or a type of sentimental significance. While I was sitting backstage waiting for the show to begin, I could attest to every model being nervous but it was a happy sort of nervous. Between all of the organizers and models, there was a common goal to have a great show and have those seats in the audience filled up. Thanks to Liam’s runway walking tips I think I did fairly well. Overall, we had a great show and it was an incredibly amazing feeling witnessing our UBC-Okanagan community-at-large come out to support multiculturalism, diversity and student creativity. Take a look below at some of the photos the Booked team snapped backstage and of the show yesterday.

-Yaw

Amanda in Saudi Arabian clothing and Susie in the Carnival of Barranquilla of Colombia