Celebrate You!... The Follow Up
What I learned from the Simply Be Celebrate You! contest was so much more than I had anticipated. I knew people would be drawn to a trip to New York City and some new digs, but what actually grew from it was dozens and dozens of people who just wanted to practice this exercise in self love. Continue....
You can check out the "Celebrate You" looks (and shop them!) at SimplyBe.com
The day I met the contest winners was an early start. I woke up as the sun rose, and threw on my favorite Simply Be leather-look skirt and my trusty Varsity jacket (a great eBay find), and headed east to the Running Rebel studio in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Inside, I met my three amazing, beautiful, vivacious contest winners: Erin (from Ohio), Kristen (from Arizona), and Shamoneke (from New Jersey). Erin and I bonded over a mutual love of Joy Division and Morrissey and exuberant prints. Kristen and I gushed over bright neons and feminism in fashion. Shamoneke moved me to tears with her radical approach to self love and empowerment and journey to becoming a more confident woman, (in fact, I can say, she moved everyone in the room to tears). We spent the whole day playing dress up in fashion from Simply Be (bold geometric prints and galaxy dresses and military jackets and kittens, oh my!), having our hair and makeup done, and talking about the evolution of the plus size community and what we can do to empower not just the women who look like us, but all women. It was a really beautiful thing. If I could even help one person fall in love with themselves, I feel like I've done my job on this world.
Julia, our brilliant photographer for the day.
This post was sponsored by Simply Be. Simply Be provided all travel and accommodations for each of the winners, and compensated me for my participation.